


Fixed

by hedera_helix



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Historical Fantasy, Magic, Multi, Witches
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-19
Updated: 2016-01-19
Packaged: 2018-05-15 00:33:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 30,820
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5764888
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hedera_helix/pseuds/hedera_helix
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Erwin looked at the sign: painted wood, neat, simple letters running on for longer than he thought necessary but then, no one could say it wasn’t informative. He glanced at the window: thin curtains, to let light in, to keep eyes out, and how that made him feel more nervous, not seeing where he was going. This was it, the last shop he hadn’t set foot in since arriving, the one he hadn’t decided to avoid but had nonetheless. He looked at the sign again:</p>
<p> </p>
<p>  <i>Kuchel’s Teashop and Apothecary - Medicines, Potions, Teas, Herbs and Spells. Curses only Upon Agreement! Brooms.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Fixed

**Author's Note:**

> A little story I thought up during the holidays because I wanted to write something lighter than Dresden. Hope you guys enjoy it!

Erwin looked at the sign: painted wood, neat, simple letters running on for longer than he thought necessary but then, no one could say it wasn’t informative. He glanced at the window: thin curtains, to let light in, to keep eyes out, and how that made him feel more nervous, not seeing where he was going. This was it, the last shop he hadn’t set foot in since arriving, the one he hadn’t decided to avoid but had nonetheless. He looked at the sign again:

_Kuchel’s Teashop and Apothecary - Medicines, Potions, Teas, Herbs and Spells. Curses only Upon Agreement! Brooms._

They didn’t have witches in the Capital; that sort of thing required old blood, border-realm pagan traditions that some king of old had no doubt weeded out from his nearest subjects in the days before the Empire. Erwin’s family didn’t have that blood either; they were too rational, too studious, too strongly rooted to the how and why of things, though his father had always said his fellow historians overlooked old wives’ tales for no other reason than pride and arrogance. He had heard those stories too as a young boy, of women with flaming hair dancing in moonlit forests, casting curses to stop cows from yielding milk, old hags rushing in to help bring children into the world before there were qualified doctors and midwives for that sort of thing. When he grew older Erwin had stopped putting much stock into it all – again, too rational, too much “of the Capital” as the people here liked to say – but now here he was. The townsfolk all believed in it and swore by it, even the most sensible of them and, growing desperate, Erwin had decided to try; after all, what harm could it do? He fiddled nervously with the buttons of his uniform jacket – a bad habit he had willed out years ago, or so he’d thought – before stepping in, waiting to see a woman bent over with age peering at him over some dusty counter and seeing instead...

A man.

And a young man at that, by the look of him: youthful face with something of the orient, to Erwin’s estimation at least, black hair cut in a style that had been in fashion in the Capital when Erwin’s father had been a boy – and among some religious orders some centuries before, judging by the history books. He was short for a person, very short for a man; if they were to stand side by side, the top of his head would barely reach Erwin’s chin. Again, something of the orient about that, he thought as he remembered the silk and spice merchants in the dome-ceilinged marketplaces of the Traders’ District, usually shorter and overall smaller in build than their customers. He was wearing a wide cravat – another thing that had gone out of style in the Capital some decades ago, people preferring a slimmer type now – paired with a white shirt, the rest of the clothes hidden from view by the counter behind which he stood.

The man looked at him with a frown, something uninviting and almost hostile in his dark eyes that made Erwin turn his gaze away first to sweep around the shop: wide plank floors, surprisingly clean with a perceptible gleam about them, a scattering of mismatched tables and chairs with lace-edged cloths, grey stone walls nearly hidden behind shelves full of bottles and little boxes, soaps, flower waters, amulets and, in the corner by the window, brooms. The counter was almost as wide as the room itself, sitting in front of a row of cupboards and shelves and a number of racks, bunches of herbs tied together with coarse strings hanging off the beams.

Erwin ventured another look at the man; he was leaning his hands on the counter now, still staring at Erwin like for some inexplicable reason his mere presence in the shop was a source of constant irritation to him. Erwin could feel the back of his head beginning to sweat and he cleared his throat, turning to examine the neat labels of the bottles on the shelves, taking a few steps and bumping against a chair which made a flatulent sound as it scraped against the floor. Erwin glanced at the shop keep, wiping at his brow and nearly knocking down a jar full of something pickled, catching it at the last second and forcing himself to breathe. It had been like this sometimes when he had been younger and his nerves had still gotten the better of him, before he had brought them under the control of his reasoning mind. He could feel the man’s eyes on him but didn’t dare to look, keeping his gaze on the tips of his polished boots as he crossed the shop, glancing back at the window before stopping by the counter and clearing his throat again.

“Would you happen to have any...” Erwin started, but a sudden feeling of stupidity and immaturity halted his sentence. Why had he come here? What was the use of any of this? The man behind the counter looked almost angry now from his impatience. “Well... Then again, perhaps not...”

Erwin tried to search for that reason behind his coming here today and found it, the memory of that long, dark hair and the way she had fixed her braid when she had sat down with them for a few precious minutes to rest her feet. She had twisted a ribbon into it, blue, like forget-me-nots and it was at that moment Erwin knew he wouldn’t for as long as he would live. She had a smile that made his heart sing in secret behind the cool composure of his expression and something about the way she looked at him made Erwin wish she could hear it too. He had waited for so long for someone like her, had held on to that most illogical of sentiments that it would be worth it in the end, to share your life with someone who made you _feel_ things. His parents had had love like that and even now, after the loneliness had long ago grown into a constant companion, Erwin was determined not to settle for less.

“You wouldn’t happen to have any love potions?”

The man looked at him with a frown that was – if possible – even deeper than the one he had worn this entire time Erwin had spent in the shop. There was something indignant about the twist of his lips that Erwin had the chance to note before they parted into a shout.

“Isabel!” he called out, his eyes still on Erwin; a low voice, unusually so, and Erwin realised he was not a young man after all, not nearly as young as he had thought before.

A door opened behind him and a young woman stepped out and Erwin thought to himself: ah, so here was the witch. Red hair, slightly unkempt, and a score of freckles across her button nose, a dark green dress with boots of supple red leather. She looked at the man inquisitively.

“Yes, big brother?” she asked.

Erwin didn’t see the resemblance.

“Do we have any love potions left?” the man asked her back, making her face light up with something Erwin didn’t care to examine; a distracting blush was rising to his cheeks as he tried to make the shop keep understand his dismayed expression to mean he didn’t want more people involved in this transaction – to no avail.

“We might,” she answered quickly. “Should I check the cupboard?”

The man nodded and she walked off to the corner of the shop where a tall cupboard stood – painted oak, brass fittings. She opened the door and Erwin could feel his eyebrows climbing toward his hairline. Instead of a row of shelves he was expecting he saw a long hallway leading into the corner through the heavy stone walls. The girl walked up the stone step and into the magical passageway, turning this way and that.

“Is it in the green ones?” she shouted from the hallway back into the shop, examining the labels on the bottles.

The man gave Erwin a long look that made another drop of sweat slide down the back of his neck. “No,” he called out to her. “The blue.”

She walked around some more – Erwin could hear her soft shuffling steps – before coming back into the shop with a blue bottle filled with a runny white liquid. She handed it to the man who placed it on the counter.

“Drink all of this over the next week,” the man told Erwin. “You do not give her any, this is all for you. A little bit every morning will do just fine.”

Erwin glanced at the girl who was still hovering by the man’s elbow. “How much do I owe you?” he asked, pulling his purse out of his pocket.

“It’s two crowns ten,” said the man.

Much less than Erwin anticipated. He pulled out the coins, nearly dropping them as the door behind the counter flew open again and another man stepped out, blond and taller than the first one.

“Hello, sir,” he greeted Erwin with a smile. “Are you getting all the help you need?”

“Yes,” Erwin hurried to reply, finally getting the money on the counter and picking up the bottle. “Thank you.”

As he turned to leave he heard the man say, “I’m glad to hear it and I wish you a good day, sir. We appreciate your business!”

He turned back at the door to look at them, a group as mismatched as their tables and chairs; he still didn’t know which one of them was the witch, or if they all had magic in them. The short man was still looking at him, but his frown had vanished; there was something almost like a smile on his lips. As soon as Erwin stepped outside, the air in his lungs seemed to find an escape and he stopped to glance around the street before setting down it, the blue glass of the bottle reminding him of forget-me-nots.

 

* * *

 

“He’s not been in here before, has he?” Farlan asked as the door swung shut, Levi’s eyes catching the shape of the man through the curtains as he walked stiffly down the street. Well, that potion clearly wouldn’t go to waste.

“No,” Levi replied, picking up a rag and wiping the pinhead balls of lint off the counter. Two crowns ten – these people from the Capital were easier to fool than he had thought.

Farlan hummed pensively for a moment. “And what did he want?”

Levi cast a careful glance at Isabel, who grinned mischievously. Again Levi thought if he had had children, he’d wished they had turned out like her.

“A love potion,” he told the man, who was still looking at the door.

“A love po– Levi!” Farlan turned to him and exclaimed. “How many times do I have to tell you, you have to stop selling things as love potion to our customers!”

“It’s what he asked for,” he defended himself in jest, making Farlan heave a sigh. And wasn’t it true? How many of them had come to the shop now asking for that? Nervous bachelors just like this one, and men in their thirties who had barely touched a pair of tits in their lives, looking for a little something to help get them further. It was all in the mind, Levi knew, and since no one had complained so far he had taken it to mean he was doing more good than harm. Was it not because of him that the butcher’s daughter was now with child? And they were so happy about it, mother and father and all.

“You know as well as I do there is no such thing as love potion,” the man told him sternly. “What did you actually sell him, Levi?”

Isabel’s chuckle turned into laughter, Levi’s smile turned into a chuckle. “What he needs,” he merely replied, breaking quickly under Farlan’s persistent stare. “Something for that constipation of his. It’s getting serious.”

“Levi,” the other man groaned impatiently.

“Oh, please. You saw that man,” Levi interrupted. “The way he looks, and an officer to boot. The wench is probably waiting for a proposal already. All he needed was something to ease his nerves. And a good long shit.” After all, if even a hopeless case like Flagon Darlett could – after drinking one of his potions and growing a few more hairs on his head – muster up the courage to ask a woman for a dance, Levi didn’t see someone like that officer having much trouble.

“But you’re teaching Isabel to lie and cheat!” the man countered. “She’s our apprentice! We need to teach her how to run a clean business.”

“Exactly, big brother,” the girl told Levi impetuously, making him scoff. “Before you came along I had never told a lie in my life, and now I’ve told seven already today. Eight if you count the love potion.”

“See?” said Farlan, pointing at her, not catching the joke. “It’s a good thing I’m at least decent enough not to rob our customers blind and take every opportunity to deceive them.”

“Is that so?” asked Levi, folding the rag up and placing it on a shelf under the counter. “So when exactly are you going to lift that spell off yourself and tell Jan how old you really are?” Hypocrites are the bastard scum of this earth, his mother had always said, and oh how right she had been.

Farlan’s face grew scarlet with a blush. “I... Not... When the time is right!” he finally stuttered. “Besides, it makes no difference. I only visit him to help him with his legs.”

“To help him get his heels over his head is more like it,” Levi told Farlan, making his blush deepen and Isabel cackle nastily by his elbow.

“Oh, shut up, the both of you!” the man told them before vanishing into the back room.

Isabel clicked her heels against the wooden floor for a moment in silence before turning to Levi, who had begun to count the coins in the register.

“Should we burn a prayer slip?” she asked him seriously. “Just in case?”

“What a waste of paper,” he muttered, clicking his tongue as he pulled a thin slip of parchment from a drawer along with a quill and a bottle of ink. ‘Forgive us this wrongdoing: lying and cheating and teasing Farlan about his age and his relations with Jan the tailor’ he wrote carefully not to smudge anything before signing the slip with his name and handing the quill to Isabel who did the same. She grabbed the slip between her forefinger and thumb before running it over to the large hearth and casting it into the flames that swallowed it up instantly.

“Much better,” said Isabel, turning to Levi and smiling before walking past him into their living quarters. “And you had better apologise to Farlan before he starts finding wrinkles again.”

Levi uttered a quiet laugh at her back before turning toward the empty shop. She was right of course, teasing Farlan about Jan the tailor was foolish of him, not least of all because he’d had that thought himself. Not that most men in the town weren’t up for a bit of this and that on the odd occasion – though Levi would not venture there unless it was absolutely necessary, and the last time had been years ago – but there was always something about an unmarried man of a certain age that caught the attention of people like him and Farlan, especially a man who had shown no interest in taking a wife in the four years he had lived there. It had become clear from the first, however, that it wasn’t Levi the tailor preferred; they had much in common, Jan and Farlan, being outsiders and of similar temperaments, and in the end it was better for Farlan to find something fixed than for Levi to have a few tussles in the tailor’s sheets.

This officer just now, however, was a different kind of newcomer, Levi could tell. It was something about how he kept his jacket buttoned all the way up to his neck, even in this mild weather. The garrison soldiers had long ago stopped bothering to look so respectable; discipline was a relative concept in small border towns like this where everyone knew everyone else – and some, like Farlan, knew everyone else’s business – and no one particularly cared for all that pomp of the Capital. In comparison the officer, with the spotlessness of that zaffre blue coat and the shine of the double row of golden buttons across his chest, looked pedantic rather than attentive. No wonder he was constipated, carrying on like that. By the look of him Levi was almost sure the man slept stiffly as a day old corpse without so much as wrinkling the sheets, and suddenly Levi found it hard to imagine him inviting some woman from the town to help him get them all tousled and stained. As Levi placed a rusty old cowbell on the counter before retreating to the back room, he thought the man might have needed a real love potion after all.

 

* * *

 

The big tavern room smelled of wood and smoke and pine and the dark ale Erwin was drinking in large gulps to calm his nerves, marvelling at the speed of the potion which seemed to be working already after two short days. He followed her with his eyes as she walked around the room, her steps so light she seemed all the while to be dancing to some merry little tune only she could hear. He thought she was paying particular attention to their table despite the fact the tavern was full of talk and laughter that night. To Erwin keeping his focus on his friends had never felt so bittersweet as it did now, nor had time moved so slowly toward that moment when she’d get to have a rest from carrying mugs and tankards and keeping those other men smiling with her sweet sing-song voice.

“Oi, Erwin!”

He turned his head at the sound of his name to face Nile’s inquiring look.

“I’m sorry, what was it that you said?”

“Will you just tell him that there is no such thing as ghosts?” the man demanded, nodding toward Lieutenant Darlett who was starting to sway gently on his seat even though the night was fairly young.

“I’m telling you, I’ve seen them!” the man insisted, making Erwin smile; not long ago he would have dismissed this kind of talk as nothing but border town superstitions, born from a lack of education in the new sciences, but even such a short time had made him question his lessons in the Capital; there seemed to be something strange in the way of life here, something old and raw and inexplicable that had already started to blur Erwin’s memories of his home. “My little sister last came to me not three nights ago, and she’s been dead since the year of the Emperor’s second wedding!”

“You were dreaming is what happened,” Nile countered, waving his hand lazily. “In the Capital the dead stay dead and this place is no different, believe me.”

“I never said she came back to life,” explained Lieutenant Darlett. “I meant I had a visitation. Most everyone here has had them. Ask anyone.”

“Oi, Marie!” Nile raised his voice over the chattering of the crowd at once; Erwin watched her turn her head and bring that long braid of hair across her shoulder as she walked over to their table, an empty tray in her hands. He reached out and took it from her; her smile made his whole body feel warm and light and new. “Have you ever had a visitation?”

“Oh, sure,” she told them matter-of-factly, placing her hands on her hips. “Many a time. My grandmother especially seems prone to visiting _._ She was dyeing wool when she died and it has never let her be since. We even finished the wool and put it in the grave with her, but it doesn’t seem to have helped – she always hated not finishing things, my grandmother.”

Erwin watched Nile’s face grow blank and embarrassed, and smiled warmly. “What does she do when she visits?” he asked Marie, who shrugged.

“Nothing in particular,” she replied as Erwin moved over on the bench to let her sit next to him; a faint scent of something under the sweat of labour, like mint and honey. “Walks around the house, mostly, moving everything back to where it was when she was living.”

“That’s what my sister does, too!” Lieutenant Darlett put in, excited. “She takes out all her dolls from the chest where we keep them.”

Across the table from Erwin Nile shook his head in disbelief. “This town is a world of its own,” he muttered, making Marie’s laughter ring out; a piercing, wondrous sound. “Witches and ghosts and trolls...”

“Who told you there were trolls here?” Marie asked him, still laughing. “Flagon Darlett, do not tell me you have fed Captain Dok a tale like that!”

“They used to come down into the valleys when my great-grandmother was a little girl,” he insisted now, making them all laugh. “It’s true! Her first love was a changeling! They were going to get married but his people came to take him back to the mountains!”

She laughed even louder at that, wiping tears from her eyes; green eyes with touches of brown here and there, like the earth in springtime.

“More likely some fellow got your great-grandmother into trouble and told that story to escape the consequence,” Nile guessed. “A scoundrel, no doubt, but not a troll.”

“That couldn’t be it,” corrected the Lieutenant. “My great-grandmother went on to marry the magistrate’s bastard son. It was a custom then for the witch to make sure that the bride was... well, suitable to continue the good magistrate’s bloodline, if you take my meaning.”

“You do at least believe in our esteemed witches, don’t you, Captain Dok?” Marie asked Nile now, her eyes twinkling as he heaved a heavy sigh.

“I would have assumed a witch to be a woman,” Erwin couldn’t resist stating, his visit to the shop so fresh in his mind. “I was very surprised to see it wasn’t the case.”

“You’ve been to see the witch?” inquired Nile, sounding nearly alarmed. “When?”

“A few days ago,” Erwin told him briefly, suddenly realising he didn’t want to invite questions about his motivations. “To get something for my back – it’s been aching lately.” He turned to Marie who was leaning her chin on her hand. “I saw three people in the shop, two men and a young woman. Which one of them is the witch?”

“Oh, they all are,” she told him to his confusion. “Mr Ackerman’s mother owned the shop before him and Mr Church – the taller one – comes from one of those salt cities by the sea. Miss Magnolia is their apprentice. She comes from somewhere past the mountains.”

“I see,” stated Erwin. “And is it common for witches to live in groups like this? I’m sorry, I’m not very knowledgeable about the matter.”

“Better they live by themselves than with the rest of us,” muttered Lieutenant Darlett under his breath, but not quietly enough not to catch Marie’s ear.

“They had better not catch you saying such things, Flagon Darlett, if you want to keep your health,” she scolded the man severely, raising a scarlet blush on his cheeks before turning to Erwin and Nile. “The same goes for you two. The last time one of you outsiders crossed the line, he ended up returning to the Capital within the week.”

“What for?” Erwin asked, making Lieutenant Darlett lean closer.

“They say his bollocks disappeared,” he whispered. “Just vanished, overnight, like they had never been there in the first place.”

“What a load of rubbish!” Nile exclaimed, while Erwin coughed.

“I was actually wondering,” he clarified, feeling a touch embarrassed, “what the fellow did to merit such a punishment.”

“Suffice it to say his manner with one of the young women in town was uncouth to say the least,” Marie explained, getting to her feet again. “Personally I think the punishment was appropriate – and more importantly since then all the soldiers have been on their best behaviour.”

“You don’t seriously believe that the man’s–” Nile started, stopping when he realised there was a lady in their presence, “–simply vanished, do you?”

“All I know is that you should never cross a witch,” Marie stated, picking up the tray from the table, “but if you’d rather risk losing your bollocks too, Captain Dok, I doubt there’s anything I can say to convince you otherwise.”

Erwin uttered a quiet laugh as Nile turned quite as scarlet as Lieutenant Darlett. He drank his ale and watched her walk away; the blue ribbon in her hair matched the soft leather of her shoes, the toes of which he could just make out under the hem of the long, brown skirt she wore. She stopped to gather some pints onto her tray, catching his stare and smiling so sweetly Erwin felt as though it could banish all the unkindness he had faced from his peers as a child. He felt reluctant to turn back to Nile and the Lieutenant, but felt as though the intensity of his gaze would doubtless alarm her if he persisted.

“If I may give you two a word of warning,” Lieutenant Darlett was saying now in a hushed voice, glancing at Marie like trying to make sure she couldn’t hear him, “I would refrain from associating with the witch too much. He has – shall we say – something of a reputation.”

“Something unlawful?” Nile hurried to inquire. “If so, the matter should be brought to the garrison Commander and the Magistrate, surely.”

“Nothing unlawful, not as such,” the Lieutenant clarified awkwardly. “The young men in this town know not to cast too many lingering looks in his direction. Not to invite... a certain kind of attention, if you catch my meaning. After all, you heard Marie. There aren’t too many of us here who dare say no to a witch.”

Erwin frowned at this claim, remembering clearly the man behind the counter – not much taller now than Erwin himself was at the age of thirteen – and questioning the ability of such an individual to intimidate trained soldiers to the measure that they dare not so much as look at him. It seemed an odd thing, all things considered; after so many years in the military Erwin no longer had illusions about the behaviour most men acquired when removed from their wives and sweethearts for extended periods of time, though he had never indulged in it himself, preferring to leave the whole matter to the imagination. Though he didn’t say anything about it, Erwin found it strange these men would find such attention so disagreeable from someone like the witch when they clearly didn’t object to it from each other.

“I think you had better find a mattress that’s good for your back, Erwin,” Nile told him, his tone serious, “to avoid becoming a regular in that shop.”

Erwin agreed quietly, glad for the change of subject when it came.

They sat in the tavern until Marie chased them out at closing time; rude of them to stay so long, but he knew he couldn’t have left earlier and removed himself from her presence, from hearing her voice and catching that scent of mint and honey in her hair. When he lay himself down on his bed and waited for sleep, he stared at the bright blue bottle on his night stand, remembering Marie’s smile, the way her eyes had lit up when she looked at him, how her hand had lingered on his shoulder when she leaned in to tell him it was time they took their leave. He thought about what the Lieutenant said about the witch, Mr Ackerman, and frowned to himself. If his potions helped Erwin finally find the love that had evaded him for so long, he decided, the man could give him all the lingering looks he wanted.

Erwin finished the potion in a week’s time, just like the witch had instructed him – it tasted bitter but had a pleasant aftertaste of elderberries – and it seemed to make all the difference; the respect of the men under his command, which previously had been anything but guaranteed, seemed suddenly forthcoming; his breathing felt somehow lighter; even his bowel seemed to remember its task again, an ailment he hadn’t realised he was suffering from but which explained much of his previous discomfort. He wondered whether it was in the nature of the draught to better one’s life in all aspects, to uncomplicate it to make room for the act of falling in love. He noted it the following week in the tavern, how his smiles had grown easier and the struggle to find things to say and stories to amuse Marie with suddenly required only a fraction of the effort it once did.

The following week brought the incident; a case of petty theft within the lower ranking officers that grew quickly out of its initial proportions. Erwin issued a punishment he believed just – a temporary withholding of salaries for all those involved – but among the locals there were murmurs of the ease with which the newcomers from the Capital with their established careers and family money left the less fortunate townsfolk without pay for their work. Even Marie grew colder towards him in her manner – one of the officers was her cousin – and though for this alone Erwin wanted to withdraw the sentence, he knew it impossible; maintaining his authority had to take priority. And how it grieved him then that he never learned to be so selfish, to have such weakness of character, to think of himself first before anything else. But there were news from the Capital, reports about unrest in the southern regions where the border had always been hastily drawn and eagerly contested, and Erwin knew if things grew worse the soldiers would need his strength much more direly than he needed a cure for his loneliness.

It was in those days that Erwin started to realise what people meant when they said one couldn’t really miss something one had never known; those easy days under the spell of the potion began growing in his mind, like a mirage in the bareness of the desert. For several weeks it wore down his resolve through nights when he was busy filing reports attesting to the incompleteness of training the men serving under him had undergone, nights when he refused Nile’s invitation to join him at the tavern. Marie didn’t ask after him, didn’t wonder where he was or what he was doing; Erwin could tell from the way Nile avoided the subject.

He returned to the witch’s shop, then, at his earliest convenience, foregoing the previous hovering by the door and marching directly to the counter on top of which stood a solitary old cowbell on a page of parchment that read: ring me. He picked it up in his hand, feeling more than a little foolish, and gave it a firm shake, drawing out an ugly clanging sound. The witch appeared nearly a minute later, wearing an apron with a few smudges of flour on it. He was frowning again as he stared at Erwin, somehow looking even more dismayed than he had before. Erwin swallowed arduously before stepping forward and clearing his throat.

“Would you happen to have any more of that potion, please?”

The man kept staring at him, his eyes narrowing like he was calculating something in his mind. He was quiet for a long time, so long that Erwin began to wonder whether he ought to say something else, before turning away and walking to the corner cupboard without saying a word. He returned a moment later with another bottle, clear this time, containing liquid with a light periwinkle hue.

“Drink this every other day,” the witch told him in his low, resonant voice. “It’s stronger than the previous one so I don’t think you’ll need to come back for another one after this.”

Erwin sighed in relief, pulling his purse out of his pocket again. “Two crowns ten?” he asked the shop keep, who shook his head.

“No charge for this,” he said in a hurry, “since the first one didn’t work.”

Erwin looked up, surprised; such a thing would have been unheard of in the Capital. “I see,” he said, giving the witch a quick smile. “Thank you, that’s very kind.”

The man waved his hand impatiently, like eager to get rid of his one and only customer and Erwin wished him good day, feeling strangely wistful about this, his last visit to the witch’s shop.

 

* * *

 

As the weather grew warmer the shop grew busier with requests that forced Levi and his friends out of the town to visit the nearby farms, where animals were let onto the summer pastures. They made their way into the hills in carts driven into town by farmhands or younger sons and daughters, often travelling great distances administering spells and protections against thieves and beasts, following ancient rituals in attempts to assure a good harvest. They returned to the town past nightfall, housing and feeding their driver more often than once to save them the journey home until morning. Nothing bothered Levi so much about it than the shit they carried in on the soles of their shoes, though it made him grateful that people weren’t built to crap as heavily as cows.

There was much to do in the shop as well; their small garden for vegetables and herbs needed weeding and tending to, potions needed to be brewed and bottled and labelled accordingly, the chimneys needed sweeping and the gutters had to be cleaned well in time before the autumn rains. This year everything seemed to be taking twice as long with Isabel needing to be taught all the while and though Farlan and Levi tried to divide the work equally, the other man’s regular appointments around the town assured the bulk of the labour was left for Levi to manage alone. Several people came into the shop with complaints of it having been closed in the middle of the day, but after Levi’s gently reminding them of the fact they were by no means his only customers, they grew content in no time.

Nearly a month had passed since he had last seen the man, that constipated officer with his shiny boots and frankly painful expression, and in those weeks Levi had managed to silence his guilt. Clearly the man must have gotten what he wanted by now, a wife or a sweetheart or a quick rub in one of those rooms above the town tavern. That second potion Levi gave him should have settled anything else wrong with the man’s stomach – and free of charge, on top of everything else – so really, all things considered, he had done the officer nothing but favours since he first came to his shop. He had been sure his conscience was clear – until he spotted that familiar bulky frame outside the shop window and swore out loud.

“Go to the back,” he hissed to Farlan and Isabel, who were going through their collection of seeds. “Now.”

“What for?” asked Farlan as Levi grabbed the back of his shirt and pushed him through the door.

“I’ll explain later,” he promised hastily, giving the man a final nudge just as the door to the shop flew open.

The officer entered stiffly, circling among the tables again after a quick glance at Levi; he was turning a pair of white gloves in his hands, peering at the things on display as if they were what he was really there to buy. Finally, he seemed to find his courage and marched forward, clearing his throat awkwardly as he stepped up to the counter.

Levi could feel a wince in his heart when the man looked up, sensing it all at once, what was wrong with him now. It had been nearly a week since the Captain had last had a good night’s sleep or eaten a whole meal; dark circles ran under his eyes and his cheeks were sunken. Many others would not have thought much of it but Levi could sense the cause, the fractures under the man’s skin, in his heart, in the core of his being.

“I’m sorry to bother you again with the same matter,” said the man quietly, “but the potion you last gave me... It seems it has ceased working.”

Levi looked at the man and felt his pain as an ache in his own heart, and that dread which came with the knowledge that the game had now gone too far. He hadn’t thought far enough ahead – he wasn’t good at that sort of thing – and here was the consequence, a broken promise he had to explain. Levi sighed heavily and placed a few of the seeds on the counter into their jars before turning back to the officer.

“Look,” he began, casting his eyes down again at the sight of the confusion on the man’s face. “There’s something I have to confess now, and you’re not going to like it. I want you to know that if you feel like hitting me afterwards you can, though I’d like you to avoid my nose, if you could.”

“Why would you think I’d want to hit you?” the officer asked him, his voice as perplexed as his expression.

Levi sighed again. “I’m sorry,” he said quietly. “There is no such thing as love potion.”

The room fell quiet as Levi kept his eyes on the worn stones on which he was standing, wishing he had been given the good sense to listen to his mother’s advice, or even Farlan’s who more recently told him to learn to act his age.

“I don’t understand,” the man countered quietly. “The potions–”

“Were for something else,” Levi interrupted, glancing up. “That’s the silver lining, I suppose, if you want to see it. I bet you haven’t had such great shits before in your life as you have these past few months.”

The man’s eyes grew dark under his heavy brows as he looked at Levi, finally understanding the situation.

“I see,” he barely said. “I’d ask for my money back, but truth be told I’d rather not accept anything else from you.”

Without further comment the officer pulled on his gloves and exited the shop, leaving Levi looking after him, realising dejectedly there really were no potions he could give the man, no cures for a broken heart.

It didn’t surprise him when other customers started coming back to the shop during the following weeks, complaining about their potions not working, or being too weak, or growing hairs on their chests instead of curing their coughs. Magic was like that, Levi knew, rooted so deep into its maker and so susceptible to variations of spirit, and no matter how much Levi tried to convince himself he didn’t care, that the officer’s pain was nothing to him, that his intention had been if not honourable then at least charitable, the magic within him was never fooled for a second.

 

* * *

 

In all his life Erwin had never been a fool. It was true he could be short-sighted at times, blinded to the intricacies of human nature by the focus he gave to his objectives, too eager to ignore the variables its fickleness brought into life’s equations. He had wanted to make sure, had wanted to _be_ sure that there were ways to guarantee these things, and in aiming for that objective he had been blinded again to that changeability. Never before had it made him feel himself so stupid and thoughtless but as he watched them now he couldn’t help thinking himself a dunce for missing something that had for weeks been so plain to see.

She had noticed his feelings for him, of that Erwin was sure. Had they perhaps tried to hide it, then, from him at least, to guard his heart somehow? Erwin wished they hadn’t, for somewhere in his mind he wanted to believe the pain would have been less had the blow landed sooner, though every time he saw them now he knew it would have made no difference. That scent of her hair, whenever it reached him now sent a burst of acid to his stomach, a gnawing pain that kept him awake at night long after he’d wished her goodnight.

To show nothing of it to the outside world was half the struggle, a disguise he maintained though he was well aware they both knew. He joined them at the tavern as regularly as before, made conversation, laughed when the others did but felt none of the comfortable warmth the room and the town in its entirety had brought him before. In his heart of hearts a numbing certainty began to grow; that his was not a life that was meant to be shared and his were not the joys that pertained to such an act, the sharing of his earnings, a home, a bed. Every night he lay awake convinced him further of that fact, and when winter came with its snow and darkness and howling winds that could chill a man to the bone, Erwin felt he had found his peace with it; after all, one couldn’t properly miss something one had never had.

Of the witch he thought but a little with resentment that rivalled his sadness. He felt he had never met someone so unkind, and found no more objections to Lieutenant Darlett’s warnings to keep the man at a distance. He would hear talk of him at times, of course, of how his potions – which Erwin strongly doubted worked at all – were growing weak and how people were growing disgruntled due to the waste of money. There were nights when he would lie in bed and dream of returning to the shop to hit the man, like he seemed to rightly deserve, but by morning these thoughts brought him nothing but shame; there was no honour in lowering oneself to the level of a common thief.

He threw himself mercilessly into his work, sometimes even managing to convince himself it was all for another purpose. The news from the Capital grew more urgent; though no declaration of war had yet been made, the imperial army had been alerted to the situation and some garrisons had been mobilised along the southern border, where villages had been burned and people gone missing, attacked by bandits on the roads that had once been safe to travel. Each new letter from his commander helped Erwin put his life into perspective, to grow further into his role as a Captain, to become who others needed him to be rather than who he was.

By midwinter he had learned to master it, that mask that hid his pain from even Nile and Marie. He could tell from how they grew bolder in his presence they believed in earnest he had overcome whatever feeling he had had for her. Not all of it was pretend; their happiness brought him joy that even his envy couldn’t dim, though he wished every day that he could be in Nile’s place, holding her hand, pulling her close, tasting in private that honey sweetness of her mouth. His body grew heavy with want that found no escape by his own hand, while his mind still resisted making light of it, reducing the act to a singular hurried occasion of lust after having waited so long for it and filling the thought with so much meaning. It would have been easy – he was not blind to the looks he received – but it seemed the colder his heart grew and the warmer his body, the less his mind seemed to think of the whole matter, eventually dismissing it entirely.

Such were Erwin’s thoughts on the eve of the new year as he walked along the streets and alleys of the town, shivering even in his fur-lined coat as an icy breeze whistled on its way between the buildings. In the light pouring out from the windows – the people here lit candles on the sills on this day, to keep away evil spirits – he could see grooves left by wagons and carts on the snow-covered cobbled streets; someone ought to come and pave them all again.

Winters were harsh and long up here in the north, he had been warned before he set out from his home, but it was the darkness he minded most; months without the sun rising higher than just above the horizon, providing a mere hour’s worth of light before disappearing again from view. It was in this perpetual twilight that they did their duties, as Erwin was now, visiting the blacksmith; he had received designs for a new kind of weapon from the Capital and had asked the town smith to build one for use as an example, for the men to learn the use of before setting out, should it come to that.

As he stepped into the smithery Erwin ran into Nile, drawing that pleased smile quickly on his face to mask the sharp sting of pain in his heart. He greeted his friend warmly, trying hard to ignore that awkwardness that existed between them now.

“What brings you here?” Erwin inquired to ease that discomfort without realising by his question he could only create more.

Nile’s eyes turned onto his feet as the blacksmith walked out of his workshop and into the room where he received his customers, holding out something to the man whose features remained embarrassed and pained.

“Here you are then, Captain Dok,” the smith told him amiably. “It may well be the prettiest ring I ever made, if I do say so myself.”

“Ah, well. Thank you,” replied Nile, accepting the jewel into his hand. “I’m sure it will do just fine.”

“May I see that?” Erwin asked to his friend’s obvious surprise, examining the ring briefly when Nile handed it to him; a hoop of bright, solid gold with a small opal fitted in the centre, shining in shades of green and brown like her eyes. “No doubt she will be very pleased with it and all the more inclined to reply favourably to your question.”

“I do hope so,” Nile said, a faint blush covering his cheeks.

“When do you plan to–”

“Tonight,” he told Erwin, fidgeting with the strings of his purse. “I wished to start the new year having made that promise.”

Erwin nodded, feeling a sudden tightness in his throat. “I’m sure you will,” he managed to say. “I’m afraid I must go, but I wish you the best of luck.”

He extended his hand which Nile took, his smile growing relieved while Erwin’s own grew ever more strained. “Thank you,” the man said. “It means a great deal to hear you say it.”

Erwin left the shop in a hurry just as Nile and the blacksmith began counting the cost of the ring, walking along the streets in a manner that seemed aimless until he realised he had reached the barracks once more. He entered his room and removed his clothes before climbing into his bed though the clock had barely struck seven, closing his eyes and wrapping his own arms around himself as guards against that coldness seeping into his heart.

 

* * *

 

It took several months for Levi’s magic to return to normal, months during which he assumed other tasks around the shop and their home. He had never minded cleaning, or cooking and baking, or tending to their fireplaces, or taking their inventory, or knitting things for them to sell, or running their errands or doing their laundry. No, he had never minded any of it.

Until it was all he did.

For weeks on end he would look enviously at Farlan, busy with spells and potions, and Isabel mimicking what he did with such enthusiasm that more than once she threatened to burn down the whole shop. Levi took it as a good sign, though. Witches should love what they did, after all, since they would most likely end up doing it for the rest of their lives. He tried to teach her the correct way to do household chores while those were all he could do, but for that she had much less passion.

By the time the snows began to melt, Levi had returned to his earlier self, having made his peace with what he had done. There was no sense in him blaming himself for the shitty state of the officer’s love life, and if the wench he was lusting after simply didn’t feel that way inclined, it was hardly Levi’s fault. In the end he realised his potions barely had anything to do with the matter; if anything they had given the man the courage to go after what he wanted, provided him with the chance to give as much of himself as he could give to the race. But in matters of love, Levi knew, effort was rarely the most important thing. The human heart had a path of its own and hers led elsewhere – there was really no greater mystery to it.

Though Levi still had to admit he was glad he hadn’t run into the officer again.

Summer came at last with its usual hurries, clearing Levi’s mind of all but the most important tasks. A few weeks after the spring sowing there occurred four deaths within a fortnight, which required everything else to be laid aside as the bodies had to be prepared and the funerals organised, all of the known wrongdoings of the deceased meticulously recorded onto prayer slips and burned and all their unfinished tasks completed and blessed. The fourth one Isabel took care of by herself and when he attended the ceremony, Levi couldn’t have been prouder of the job she had done. There was a solemnity to her voice when she spoke the blessings and incantations the like of which Levi could have barely imagined her to be capable of, her being so… Well, like she was.

They hired an extra pair of hands for midsummer, as usual, a young woman whose name they chose from several dozen others. Nearly everyone wanted their children to be picked to help the witches, as if this would guarantee some sort of particular favours and protections on their house. They spent the night on the meadows near the town, picking basketfuls of plants that got their strength from the summer solstice, rewarding their helper with an assortment of potions, Farlan adding in one piece of gossip about a boy who had caused the young woman much sorrow a few months earlier.

The plants and herbs provided their usefulness sooner than they’d expected when a mere week later they were all invited to attend a wedding and to perform the customary rituals with the bride the morning of the wedding. They gathered their supplies – lotions and soaps, amulets and books, flower waters and prayer slips and candles with calming scents – and set out to the tavern a few hours after dawn where the bride was awaiting with her company of six bridesmaids, all of whom greeted them with the highest courtesies, offering them pomegranate cordial and honey cakes while they set up their wares.

“First things first,” Farlan declared, pulling a thick wad of the prayer slips from one of the baskets. “If the bride could kindly write down all her past indiscretions.”

A woman in a white nightshirt stepped forward, smiling a touch nervously as she selected a few dozen slips and retreated to the corner of the room with a quill and ink, while the rest of the young ladies crowded around Levi and Isabel, demanding to sample every scent and every kind of hair oil they had pulled up from their stock. Beyond the noise of the gaggle Levi could hear Farlan helping the bride burn the slips.

“Are they alright?” she was asking nervously. “I didn’t really know what to write so I just put it all down.”

Levi glanced at Farlan who was wearing a frown as he read through the slips slowly. “This one’s fine, and so are these. Quite frankly you wouldn’t have needed to write this one down.”

“Really?” inquired the bride, looking surprised.

“Oh, we’ve all done it,” Farlan told her, waving his hand dismissively and sipping on his cordial, nearly chocking on it when something in another slip caught his eye.

“I know,” the bride said, sounding apologetic. “That one’s perhaps a touch–”

“Well,” Farlan mused, still clearing his throat, “at least you did it with your fiancé. Let us be grateful for that.” He handed the slips back to the woman. “Into the fire then, and the faster the better.”

She cast the parchment into the flames while Farlan murmured a blessing, emptying his glass which was instantly refilled. Levi took a sip of his own drink, but knew right away the overly sweet alcohol would disagree with his stomach, and left his glass untouched for the rest of the morning, which was full of the laughter and excitement of the party as they fretted over their dresses and ran about the room, fighting over whose turn it was in front of the dressing table. The tips of Levi’s fingers turned quickly prune-y from all the hair he washed, and twice he had to run back to the shop to get a potion he hadn’t realised would be needed in such great quantities. Who knew all these women would have their blood on the same day?

When Levi returned he found the bride had been groomed and dressed, her mother having come in to sew the traditional last stitches on the hem of her gown of white lace. Farlan was still drinking his cordial, the bridge of his nose growing red as he leaned in to the bride’s ear to whisper all the gossip he had about her bridesmaids – a custom she seemed to embrace with great enthusiasm, turning to look at each of her friends in turn with an expression equal parts mirth and shock.

“What did he say?!” one of the bridesmaids finally cried out as the bride turned to her, doubling over with laughter. “Did he tell you the... with–”

“Now, now, Miss Seraphine, you know the rules,” Farlan told her wickedly. “For bride’s ears only, unless you want to plague your friend with bad luck on her wedding day.”

The young woman looked around herself in confusion for a moment before accepting her fate with a sullen pout as the bride gathered herself and wiped the tears of joy from her eyes.

“Oh, don’t worry Seraphine!” she teased from her place in front of the mirror. “I’m sure someone will still have you. Not anyone too respectable, but someone, I’m sure.”

“Marie!” gasped Seraphine, her lips drawing into a smile despite herself.

“I know you’ve had your eye on Captain Smith for a while now,” Marie told her in jest, fastening earrings onto her ears, “and before this day I would have approved of the match whole-heartedly but now... I’m afraid I cannot in good conscience recommend you for his bride.”

“Come now, ladies,” the bride’s mother hushed them gently. “Behave yourselves.”

“Indeed,” Farlan concurred as Levi threaded a needle to fix a tear in the hem of one of the bridesmaids’ gowns. “Not that I disagree with the bride, Seraphine, but you both ought to mind your tongues some. After what you wrote in that prayer slip I don’t think you have earned the right to be too judgemental, Marie.”

She flashed him a wide grin through the mirror as her mother fitted the veil on her head. “Say what you will,” she told him proudly, “my honour remains intact.”

Levi had always found weddings rather dull affairs, but he knew better than to decline an invitation. Having a witch shun your wedding was the clearest sign for the couple that something was wrong with the match, and more than enough to make them wonder whether some past blunder in their treatment of the town witch had earned their marriage to be cursed from the start. He expected these festivities to be no different, vows that only really meant anything to their speakers, weeping relatives, some stew and ale before more honey cakes.

Until Levi saw him.

He was standing near the altar dressed in a ceremonial uniform with epaulettes and medals, a thin sword with a gilded handle hanging off his belt. Levi guessed he was the best man, and from the waves of sadness rippling through the air between them, he could tell the man wished he were the groom instead. He was wearing a smile as he talked quietly with his friend, a dark man with a moustache and a goatee, another newcomer in their town, but Levi could tell its width was due in no small part to the man wishing to hide how painful he found it all. And who could blame him, having to watch his friend marry the woman he loved. When his eyes met Levi’s across the room the smile faltered, making way to an angry frown that forced Levi’s own gaze onto his feet as that old sting of guilt pierced his mind.

He enjoyed the wedding even less after that, excusing himself as soon as he thought appropriate – after the honey cakes, of course. Right before them the officer gave a stiff and formal speech which his colleagues from the Capital seemed to enjoy while Levi caught more than one yawn from the locals and two from Isabel. The last thing Levi saw before he slipped out of the door was the sight of the officer dancing with the bride, his eyes closed as he drew in the scent of herbs in her hair that for the shortest of moments Levi was sure he could also smell himself.

 

* * *

 

Erwin didn’t remember ever having drunk so much, not even during his days as a cadet in the public houses of the Capital where on Friday evenings a pint of ale could cost as little as a tenth of a Crown. Or perhaps his tolerance had been better when he was a younger man than he was now. Such terrible disregard for manners; not that he got rowdy or wept in open or did any of those things that drunkards do to ruin these kinds of events. He had sworn to himself to be present and sober for the whole of the celebration; another in a long line of promises to himself he could no longer keep.

He walked along the streets of the town that even after the year he had spent inside its walls refused to feel like home. At best he had grown accustomed to it, its sandstone buildings and winding alleys, the often rickety shutters on the windows and that stark contrast of light and darkness, of winter when the nights melted together and the summers when the days never seemed to end. Even now, well after midnight, his way was illuminated by a dusk-like glow that helped him find his way into the part of town he didn’t know so well; the realm of the witch. He had avoided these streets for months, ever since the man had so carelessly shattered the one dream he had allowed to take hold of his heart.

Had it not been due to the witch’s lies that he had taken the situation so lightly? Had not his trust in the draught the man gave him made him overly confident, too sure of himself and his chances with Marie to show her in time his true nature, to let her hear that secret song she made ring within his heart? Was the witch not the cruellest, most soulless creature to walk this earth for letting people think such things could be true, that such magic could exist, that such blessings could be bestowed upon men like Erwin who didn’t know how to speak their feelings, didn’t know how to draw people in, or how to let them close? Was it not all his fault; the ring, the wedding, the scent of mint now moving from her hair onto the sheets of her marriage bed?

Erwin stared at the door that seemed to swim in front of his eyes, though in truth he must have been swaying back and forth himself; his legs seemed to have suddenly grown inadequate to support the weight of his body. He could feel a painful strain in his throat as he brushed his hand over his eyes, letting that resentment out in his voice as he raised it to pierce through the drowsy silence of the tender summer night.

“Witch!” he shouted. “You lying, cheating bastard!”

Nothing happened; the shutters remained closed, the windows remained empty; a dog barked in the distance.

“It’s your fault!” he yelled, his voice breaking. “Yours and your false potions’!”

He could see a dim light framing the shutters of the second floor window, nearly falling on his arse as he looked up toward it, a half-empty bottle of wine still dangling from his unfeeling hand.

“You fucking witch!” shouted Erwin, forcing as much of that pain in his chest into his voice as he could. “Come down here and face what you did! Come down here and finish it!”

Finally, the door flew open and in that second when Erwin’s eyes met the figure of the man at the threshold he forgot what he had come here for. More than just disregard for manners, this; he was behaving like a drunken lout, shouting in the streets like a madman, disrupting the peace of the people he was sent here to protect. He looked at the frown on the witch’s face and wiped at his nose with his hand, nearly spilling the wine on his shirt.

“I...” Erwin started, growing smaller under the witch’s stare. “My apologies. I... I don’t know what...”

The man by the door stepped aside, holding it open for Erwin. “Come in,” he said, sounding suddenly kind under that hostile expression. “You look like you could use a cup of tea.”

He hesitated for a while, looking around himself in the empty street and wondering how the evening could have led him here of all places, to make a fool of himself in front of the person he resented the most. He glanced at the man again; still and serene, wearing slacks and a shirt, his hair ruffled by sleep, nevertheless willing to let Erwin into his home, to make him tea and sit with him, an uncivilized pillock though he was. He took a tentative step forward and then another, finally crossing into the witch’s shop again; another broken promise to himself.

He fell into a chair by one of the round, lace-covered tables; the cloth like Marie’s dress. The witch walked past him and disappeared into the room beyond the counter, returning after a moment with a kettle and a candle; the former cast iron, the latter in a brass holder. He lay the candle onto the table and breathed new life into the coals in the hearth with bellows before throwing in a few logs and setting the kettle to boil. Erwin watched him, the precise nature of his movements, the ease with which he regarded the situation that caused Erwin more shame after every second of silence.

When he finally got the tea ready he sat down across the table; just one cup on a saucer, a faint scent of lavender and vanilla.

“Drink,” said the witch quietly. “It will make you feel better.”

Erwin looked at him and accepted the beverage, his hands suddenly remembering his upbringing and holding it without a tremble, even when he took a sip and burned his tongue. He could feel the man’s eyes on him as he placed it back on the table; a familiar taste, nostalgic even, like a memory from his childhood he had almost forgotten.

“I’m sorry,” said Erwin again, feeling a blush rising on his cheeks. “I never meant to disturb-”

“It’s fine,” the witch interrupted, raising his hand. “Quite frankly I’m surprised you didn’t come here sooner. And I really wasn’t joking about that punch.”

Erwin uttered a quiet laugh. “I must admit the thought crossed my mind,” he confessed, sipping at the tea again more carefully, feeling his embarrassment disappearing with a new flavour; green cardamom, like those sweets his mother used to buy him from vendors in the marketplace. “I’m glad I have been able to keep some of my honour, at least.”

“I’m almost sure I deserve it,” said the witch now, lowering his gaze. “It was one of the most rotten things I’ve done in my life.”

Erwin agreed without saying a word, drinking the tea eagerly now; its flavour was ever changing, from the green cardamom to wood strawberries to a hint of the coffee his father used to love, and each gulp seemed to bring to his mind some new memory, some buried treasure that warmed his heart and eased his breathing until a flavour flowed onto his tongue, of mint and honey, and it seemed as though an invisible hand had closed around his throat. He tried to swallow down the throbbing ache, but it kept bubbling up, filling his eyes with hot tears.

“It’s fine,” the man told him kindly. “It’s the tea.”

Erwin covered his face with his hands, letting the sadness flow over and onto his cheeks where it seemed to burn his skin; he could feel his shoulders shaking as he fought for breath, feeling the coarse lace of Marie’s dress on the tips of his fingers, feeling her body against his, feeling her smile against his chin as he kissed her at the end of the dance they shared. Those last trembling notes of the waltz might as well have been his funeral song, so much did letting go of her hand feel like a kind of death to him. He couldn’t remember having cried like this since his father passed away; he had wept for days, the man had been so dear to him, and though this pain didn’t compare, it made him remember all his past sadness, all his unfinished mourning.

“There is a reason love potions don’t exist,” said the witch in a whisper. “My mother told it to me before she died, when I was a little boy. She said there are things in all of our lives that can be altered and changed with magic - sickness, appearance, the harvest. Only two things we cannot change, things that are fixed so firmly. The other one is death, and love the other. In these two matters none of us get a say.”

Erwin looked at the man through a veil of tears, taking in his words and that quietly melancholy expression.

“In some of our cases love will be swift and bring happiness,” the man went on, “and in the case of others it will be slow in coming, or end as quickly as it begun. Others still will never truly know it for as long as they live. Neither you nor I can decide which one our lives will hold.”

The witch passed Erwin a handkerchief and he wiped at his face, wondering at first why he didn’t mind the man seeing him like this, then finishing his tea and wondering no longer. He glanced quickly at the man; dark eyes full of sympathy and unexpected kindness, thin lips pursed tightly together, thin brows drawn into that perpetual frown. By the time Erwin climbed into his bed in the barracks he had forgotten the tastes of the tea, but that face seemed to follow into his dreams that night, still, serene and soothing.

 

* * *

 

The following days brought the customary heat of July, days that seemed to droop heavily upon the town and make breathing difficult. Thunder kept brewing, making the air bristle without release, dark clouds gathered on the distant mountains, flashing with lighting but never descending to ease the tensioned weather. It made Levi restless and all the tasks they still had much harder than they had to be. He ran out of soap trying to keep the sweat off his body, and nights were too hot for sleep, so he spent them outside the town in meadows looking for those tender blossoms that are best gathered in the twilight dimness of summer nights.

Of course he thought about the officer then. It was hardly surprisingly, the man being the only exciting thing that had happened in the town since the tailor had arrived four years ago. There was something so muddled and odd about the whole situation, how it had played itself out, that Levi found it difficult even now to wrap his head around it. When he walked in the dewy fields some hours before dawn, he remembered the scents of the tea he had brewed the man; vanilla and lavender, green cardamom, something sweet and something earthy until that last one took over, mint and honey, strong and brazen and persuasive. They told something about the Captain, no doubt, of his life before he got here, of that misfortune later on, and it made Levi wonder.

He had never made that tea for himself; what purpose would it have served? To cry about his mother, remember the scent of her silk blossom perfume, to hear that stony _clink clink clink_ of the pestle and mortar in his ears, his unintended lullaby for those first years of his life? He remembered it well enough, and besides it had been years ago – surely he’d cried enough about it back then.

And still Levi wondered, about the Captain, the way he had sat across the table and let the tears wet his cheeks. That was the right way to do things, to force the sorrow out. Men had to do that, be forceful about it, it didn’t come naturally to talk and share and… _feel_ things. And it was good Levi had helped him with that, perhaps made up for some of the nastiness from before. Still, no one had ever been that to him before, no one had ever confided in him like that, been so vulnerable and honest. There was something so intimate about it that it made Levi blush, alone though he was among the dew-heavy honeysuckle.

When the man returned to the shop a week later Levi’s cheeks still flushed an ugly shade of pink – something Farlan didn’t miss, judging by the flash Levi saw of his smug expression as he left the shop for a tryst with Jan the tailor. The Captain looked at him from across the room, hovering nervously near the door and it seemed to Levi he was trying to avoid the shelf-covered walls, as if fearing he might knock something down again. He caught the man’s eyes after a moment – clearly he still wasn’t sleeping properly – and nodded toward one of the tables, an invitation the Captain accepted by sitting down hurriedly, the large frame of his body growing suddenly less obtrusive. Levi made them a pot of tea – something milder, meant to lighten the mood – and sat down himself just as the first soft purrs of thunder carried in through the open window; the heat was breaking.

“I came to apologise,” the man started, just as Levi had expected, turning the simple cup of blue china in his large hands. “My behaviour the other night was… inexcusable.”

“Don’t worry,” Levi told him, pouring the tea as the first heavy drops of rain started to fall. “I can think of one very good excuse.”

The man lifted his gaze and smiled almost coyly. “Still, I felt it necessary to say how sorry I am, and also how grateful for your patience and kindness. How you didn’t turn me from your door the moment you saw me is beyond my comprehension.”

Levi remembered suddenly the way the Captain had looked that night, dishevelled, missing his jacket, his hair falling over his thick brows, that half-empty bottle of wine gripped tightly in his hand – a stark contrast to this neat exterior, and somehow indecent.

Levi could feel that blush heating up his face. “It was the least I could do,” he said, trying to focus on his tea instead of the piercing blue of those eyes, “after everything.”

The Captain uttered a quiet laugh. “If I may ask, do you suppose it would be possible for us to leave all that behind ourselves now? It seems to me we’ve both made some errors in judgment, which ought to cancel each other out.”

“Sure,” Levi agreed, feeling more relieved than he would have expected.

“I’m glad,” said the man, still smiling. “I dislike unnecessary enmity, and I’ve come to realise it doesn’t do in this town to be on bad terms with the witch.”

Levi laughed as well. “Only if you want that good night’s sleep.”

The man looked up sharply. “How did you-”

“I know what people need without them telling me,” Levi explained, taking a sip of the tea. “It’s what witches do.”

The Captain’s expression remained surprised; no magic in the Capital – well, no magic that most people knew about in any case – since they had their machines and cogs and puffs of steam and those “new sciences”. Here it was inconceivable, how anyone could forget.

“This place is truly exceptional,” said the man, drinking his tea. “I feel as if the stories of my childhood are coming to life right before my eyes.”

“Just wait until Farlan comes back,” Levi replied, “and you’ll see him age ten years in the blink of an eye.”

“That reminds me,” the man said, clearing his throat, “I don’t believe we’ve been properly introduced.” He straightened his posture – how was that even possible? The man had always looked like he had a pole thrust up his arse – and extended his hand. “Captain Erwin Smith, at your service.”

He shook the hand quickly. “Levi Ackerman,” he replied, “but you should just call me Levi, I don’t care for all that Mr Ackerman nonsense.”

The man smiled. “Then please, feel free to call me Erwin,” he said. “It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Levi.”

Guess people in the Capital had different standards for what passed for pleasure.

“Sure,” Levi muttered, taking a sip of his tea; it tasted suddenly more exotic than he though before, like goldfruit and waxskin and sweetseed.

“I must admit, I do admire your place of business,” said Erwin, looking around at the shelf-covered walls again, holding the cup and saucer in his hand. “It’s very organised.”

“I can’t stand clutter,” Levi replied, taking another sip. Too sweet, and growing sweeter by the second; he lay the cup down at once.

“I only wish my soldiers were half as meticulous as you,” Erwin complimented quietly, making Levi scoff; hadn’t he just told the man he needn’t bother with more apologies and making amends?

“Might as well wish everyone was,” Levi told him, making him utter another laugh.

“Quite right,” he said. “Though I must admit my skills in regard to that leave something to be desired.”

“It’s never too late to learn,” Levi responded, topping up his cup to balance the sweetness only to have the tea turn sickening a few minutes later.

The door opened to admit a customer, an old woman who was leaning heavily on a walking stick, and Levi was forced to leave Erwin alone to finish his tea; he was done before Levi was, but didn’t get up from his seat until the door closed again. He walked up to Levi beside the counter.

“I’m afraid I must go,” he said as Levi tilted his head back to see his smile, “but I find this has been very pleasant.”

“Better than last time?”

Erwin laughed. “Yes, much better. At least I didn’t make a fool out of myself this time.”

“I don’t think you made a fool out of yourself,” Levi told him earnestly.

The man stayed quiet for a while, looking somewhat surprised again. “Thank you,” he finally stated. “It makes me very glad to hear you say so.”

And there was that blush again.

“You should borrow an umbrella,” Levi told him, becoming suddenly aware of the rain and walking around the counter and through to the back door to fetch one, presenting it to the smiling Captain.

“Thank you,” he said again. “I will make sure to return this to you presently.”

“There’s another thing,” Levi remembered, walking into the corner cupboard to take a bottle off the shelf, deep purple with a dark red liquid inside. “Drink this when you can’t sleep. No more than a small sip, or two if the first doesn’t help.”

“Thank you,” Erwin said a third time, “but I must pay you for it.”

“No,” Levi told him sternly. “Like this I’m no longer in your debt.”

Erwin looked down at him for a moment of silence, before pocketing the potion and taking his leave, turning back at the door to thank him one more time.

He came back with the umbrella early in the morning after it finally stopped raining a few days later, staying only for a quick cup of tea before heading out again, and from that day it seemed no matter where Levi went, the Captain was there as well, buying fruit at the market when Levi was getting his vegetables, getting his sword sharpened at the blacksmith’s when Levi brought in a pot with a broken handle, looking for more ink at the bookshop when Levi went in for prayer slips and wrapping papers. They would usually exchange a few words or an acknowledging nod that made Levi blush inexplicably. He seemed to be sleeping better now, and the sadness in his chest seemed somewhat lessened, and Levi was glad even if it meant the man had no reason to visit his shop now.

Not that Levi would have had time to sit with him even if he had. There was still so much to do, so many plants to harvest and herbs to collect and on top of everything the spell on the corner cupboard broke one day, spilling the contents onto the shop floor in a mess of broken glass, potions, teas and seeds, one of which rooted itself instantly to the floor boards and grew into a rosebush in a matter of days. Cleaning up the mess took Levi, Farlan and Isabel two days, and afterward new orders had to be put in, more ingredients purchased and collected, and new potions brewed to make up for the loss of stock. For a week Levi had four pots on the stove and two in each fireplace, and running between them to keep the flames alive made for an uncomfortably warm task.

The arrival of August marked a change; due to the recent loss of money they decided to save and catch their own lampreys this year from the river that ran near the town. The work was far more pleasant, sitting by the banks weaving traps and waiting until evening to row out to the deep and lay them. They took turns checking them to start with, but Levi soon found he enjoyed the solitude of those hours before dawn and requested the job for himself. Farlan didn’t object – he had been spending more and more nights at the tailor’s shop of late – and Isabel was often still in bed when Levi returned with their catch, having missed the opening hour of the shop.

It was one of those mornings when Levi saw Erwin walking across a meadow near the river with a gun leaning onto his shoulder but no gamebirds or rabbits to go with it. The man spotted him from a distance and changed his course, coming up to Levi, the cool predawn air raising a healthy redness to his cheeks.

“Hullo,” the man called out somewhat breathlessly as Levi nodded. “What brings you out here so early?”

“Lamperns,” Levi told him, nodding at the wicker basket on his back. “And you?”

“Ah,” Erwin breathed out, adjusting the weapon which looked heavy even in his hands. “I was testing this out there in the woods. I didn’t want to disturb anyone with the sound.”

“What’s it for?”

“It’s a model for a new weapon being produced in the Capital,” Erwin explained. “Should there be war it will bring our troops a great advantage.”

“And will there be?” Levi asked now. He had heard the rumours, of course – Farlan brought them home from his errands, with countless others no doubt – but hadn’t thought much about them; there had never been a soldier whose fate he had taken so close to heart. Well, never before now.

“I’m afraid it does not look very promising,” said Erwin, his expression growing serious. “The Emperor waits for a word from his ambassadors, which ought to bring the final decision.”

“It’ll be bad for business,” Levi replied, though loss of money was the last thing on his mind then.

“Yes,” said Erwin. “I don’t doubt it will. But surely a witch’s remedies will never be considered a redundant luxury. I know they’ve worked wonders on me.”

Levi could feel the blush creeping onto his cheeks again, hoping the coolness of the morning to mask the real cause for it. “You’ll need a lot more of them if the war breaks out,” Levi told the man, who nodded solemnly.

“And I will surely miss them when I go,” he replied before shifting the gun onto his other shoulder. “Come. Let us walk back together.”

He stayed for a cup of tea, and though the blend Levi chose was rich and spicy, that feeling growing in him turned it cloying at the touch of his lips against the brew. The next week the complaints started coming in again; the potions and teas were too strong, just a sip of this kept a man hard for hours, a cup of that made a woman’s chest so sensitive she could barely put on a shirt.

“What’s gotten into you then?” Farlan asked him after a few days as Levi was marking down reimbursements in the ledger. “It’s not like you to have this problem.”

And Levi knew, but didn’t say a word.

 

* * *

 

Post was only carried to the town from the Capital once a week, so Erwin was a few days late learning about the Emperor’s declaration. In the end it came as no surprise, though Erwin still took great care in reading its facsimile in the newspaper; careful words, encouraging and pressing but never too alarming. The prince ruler of their southern neighbour did not, it seemed to Erwin, possess the experience of age the Emperor had. No doubt the war would be over quickly, though never as quickly as everyone hoped. An escalation of border skirmishes, nothing but a schoolyard rivalry worsening into a punch-up, but on a dangerously large scale. And now so many people had to die, because an arrogant little sod wanted a few additional square miles of land to call his own.

Well, it wasn’t for Erwin to philosophise. He would obey his orders as soon as they arrived.

He folded up the newspaper and turned to his letters, reading the one from his commander through carefully; they wouldn’t be needed yet, the Emperor didn’t wish to mobilise more garrisons than was necessary, counting on a vast reserve the like of which his opponent would be hard pressed to match. It was only a matter of time, Erwin knew, before the marching orders came and by then everything needed to be just so.

The men had improved considerably under his command and had even started to take their roles more seriously, or so it seemed to Erwin, who wasn’t irritated by unbuttoned jackets and unpolished boots nearly as often nowadays as he strolled around the town. They had all learned the use of the new weaponry, though to varying degrees of success, and would now at least be qualified for further training on the barrack yards of the Capital, which would be the first stop on their long journey from home. They had learned to obey him if not respect him, which perhaps was all he could hope for, and all he really needed from them at the end of the day, for things not to dissolve into utter chaos. There had been no more incidents since that petty theft nearly a year ago, and Erwin was glad the punishment he had ordered had not gone to waste.

He looked up to see the rain hammering against his window; not quite the first of the autumn days, but the weather was certainly turning, even if the air was still mild and fragrant. He remembered the days of his youth, the last idle days of summer before his studies would resume, sitting in the armchair in their modest little salon and reading to the pattering of the rain, eyes glued to the page for hours until his mother would call him into the parlour for tea. It was always served with thick slices of white bread with a generous spreading of marmalade – always more generous after his father passed away. Suddenly he thought to brew himself a cup, getting as far as the small stove in the corner of his room, until changing his mind, pulling on his coat and grabbing an umbrella before heading out the door.

The walk over to the witch’s shop was swift – his legs seemed eager to carry him there – and when he stepped in the sweet-smelling warmth of the room felt more comforting than the memory of his home had been earlier. Erwin met Levi’s eyes across the counter before he took a seat at the table by the window, waiting patiently for the man to have a break from his customers to carry over a pot of tea; he was happy to see the two saucers instead of one this time.

“I’ll join you in a minute, if that’s alright,” said Levi, placing the dishes down.

“I’d be delighted,” Erwin replied with a ready smile pulling at his lips as he watched the man rushing over to the rosebush growing out of the floor of the shop; again, very unusual, but Erwin took pride in not being utterly floored by it.

He had done this for a few weeks now, tea breaks in the witch’s shop, ever since they had run into each other by the river outside town. Would someone have asked him what it was that kept bringing him back, Erwin wasn’t sure he would have had an answer. There was something relaxing about this place now, post his paroxysm; the moment had been as – if not more – embarrassing as any past humiliation he had suffered in his life, but unlike those it had ended in the most positive of manners. There was no shame left now in Erwin’s thinking about that night, just a kind of relief he couldn’t remember having experienced before, like something had undone a knot in his chest that had constricted his heart for decades. Besides, he could hardly fall victim to any humiliation worse than the first, which gave it all a thoroughly relaxing air.

“Busy day?” Erwin asked Levi when he finally sat down with a heavy sigh.

“That bloody bush keeps making rose hips every two days now,” the man huffed in annoyance. “We’re running out of room to store them. If you couldn’t make so many bloody things out of them I swear I’d pull that thing out of my floor with my bare hands.”

“I’m sorry to hear it’s a nuisance,” said Erwin, pouring the tea. “It’s wonderful to look at.”

Levi agreed sullenly. “We’ll see how long it will keep,” he said, looking at the bush.

“News from the Capital,” Erwin suddenly remembered. “The war–”

“I know,” Levi interrupted. “I already heard it from Farlan.” He took a break, stirring his tea with an old silver spoon dimmed with age. “So I guess you’ll be leaving then.”

“Not yet,” Erwin told him, feeling suddenly glad it was so. “The orders will come before long. I’d guess in a month or so at the latest.”

Levi nodded quietly before taking a sip of his tea and grimacing. Erwin brought his own to his lips; it tasted dark and strong, almost over-brewed – precisely what he was in the mood for.

“Don’t you like the tea?” Erwin asked Levi. “I find the taste most pleasing.”

Levi shook his head. “It’s just a bit strong,” he said, taking another sip.

They talked in this vein for nearly an hour, about the causes of the war, about life in the town, about how Mr Church knew everything about everyone – the man had made gossip his business, it seemed – and Erwin was pleased to find someone who agreed with his view of the Sand Prince and this conflict he had brought over all their heads – though it seemed Levi held a similar estimation of the Emperor as well. Northerners were not, it seemed, the most loyal and patriotic of subjects.

Like always when leaving the shop, Erwin felt his spirits lifted and a spark of new energy coursing through him. He hadn’t felt so like himself since he learned about the falseness of the potion and though the sight of Marie still filled his heart with a dull ache, there were moments when he could almost forget how sad he had been a mere two months earlier. In this aspect – though it was a paradoxical and shameful thought – the war was a blessing, giving Erwin’s life focus and aim to move past the whole affair, to divert his attention and efforts to something that better deserved them.

That want his body had grown unfeeling to during the cold winter months returned as the summer waned, filling his nights with restless dreams and leaving additional work on his sheets for the woman who cleaned his rooms. It seemed almost adolescent, the eagerness of his body which sometimes manifested even during the day while he was sitting at his desk, writing reports or keeping up with his correspondence. The thoughts he had during moments like these, the images projected by his feeling mind, seemed to grow bolder as well. One night as he was returning to his rooms through the barracks, he happened upon two men in the midst of a very private act in the empty, dimly lit mess hall, and for weeks afterward whenever he gave into the urge and lay his hand upon himself, all he could think about was what he had then witnessed.

It took a while for Erwin to realise that tension was seeping into his dealings with Levi; well, it was understandable – being in the state he was in, most days he would have felt such with most anyone, no doubt. It was something in the silences when they started to linger, and something further in both the hasty glances and long, absent stares the man gave him. They birthed a thought, nothing serious to begin with, that grew quickly into a consideration, quite deliberate and earnest, until something in Erwin’s mind remembered his past reluctance, the years he had spent waiting, for the right person, the right moment, the right… what have you. At times it seemed so foolish and held so little meaning to Erwin now that he all but got out of his bed to carry out the deed at once, but even so he was who he had always been – reserved, disciplined, pedantic – and in the end he did nothing, even on the nights when the memory of the soft, low hum of Levi’s voice was all he needed to bring down the swelling.

He grew fonder of those moments they shared over cups of tea, of their pleasant conversations, of Levi and the honesty of his nature, his outspokenness, which he found a refreshing change after the pomp and ritual of the Capital. There was never any need to read into the man’s words, no need to wonder whether he had truly meant what he had said and Erwin savoured the trust that could thus flower between them. He found he could tell the man most anything, about his father, of whom he seldom spoke these days, of the loneliness of his youth, the things he rarely shared. And in turn he treasured Levi’s stories of life in the town, of travelling the country during his apprenticeship, of his eventual return to his home to take over the shop his mother had once run. He had kept the name; most his customers wouldn’t find it confusing, being well versed in the lineage of most every one of their neighbours. Erwin delighted in how easy Levi’s smiles grew after a few months of this, how those frequent frowns turned into rare occasions, and when the news finally came Erwin was surprised to find his reluctance to leave was due as much to what he was now leaving behind as it was to what he knew to lie ahead.

 

* * *

 

Amulets and talismans and protective spells had never been among their most frequently sold products until the news of the garrison being mobilised had circled the town. There was a rush to the shop, everyone wanted to send their son or husband or lover off with added hope for their return. When the bookshop ran out of prayer slips Levi and Farlan started selling some of their own stock; neither of them had such need for them, after all, though Levi saved a few just in case, to soothe some of that dread that was growing in his mind.

His cautiousness proved foreseeing when Erwin came into the shop for a visit Levi had wished for but not really expected. It was his last night in the town and Levi couldn’t stop himself reading into the gesture. After all, the man had friends, colleagues, people he cared about – what made their connection so special that he chose to abandon them for Levi’s company if not some deeper bond, some secret feeling Erwin wasn’t willing to show?

Or then perhaps his friends were spending their last nights with their wives and families and Erwin had no choice but to join Levi, the other eternal bachelor in town.

“Will you join me for a cup?” Erwin asked and Levi agreed with a nod, brewing them a pot and leaving Isabel in charge of the customers who were still pouring in for last minute purchases before closing time.

“You’re all packed then?” Levi asked the man, making him laugh.

“In a manner of speaking,” he replied, pouring the tea. “There isn’t much that I’m taking with me.”

Levi nodded and sipped at his tea; the sweetness had started to balance itself out over the months after the realisations, though the feeling itself was still as strong as ever, an acute, piercing desire overlying something deep and raw and complete. He looked at the man, the turned-up collars of his jacket, the curve of his nose, the little wrinkles forming in the corners of his eyes when he smiled, and at that moment there was nothing he wouldn’t have given to touch that face, to make those lips part by running the tip of his thumb over them.

“So what’s the story behind the amulets people keep buying?” Erwin asked him now. “I thought you said death is fixed, that magic cannot alter that fate.”

“They’ll ward off injury and disease,” Levi explained, “and give their buyers some peace of mind, if nothing else.”

“And they do actually work?” asked Erwin, earning a glare from Levi as a response. “Ah, I’m sorry. I suppose there’s still a fair bit of the sceptic in me.”

“Well, if I’m being honest I’m not sure how well the magic in them will keep,” Levi admitted quietly. “Taking them far out of the town might weaken the spells, and so might the southern climate.”

“Is that very important for magic?” Erwin wanted to know. “Weather and such conditions?”

“They can be,” said Levi. “Has anyone bought you one?”

Erwin looked up from his cup in surprise before uttering a quiet and joyless laugh. “Who would buy me such a thing?” he asked, drinking his tea as Levi frowned. “But tell me. Are there any other things that people from these parts do? Besides amulets, I mean. I feel as a Captain I ought to know.”

“We burn prayer slips,” Levi told him. “Do you do that in the Capital?”

“It’s an old custom, written about rather than obeyed these days, I’m afraid,” said Erwin. “And this is to appease the spirits?”

Levi nodded. “Most likely it’s a load of rubbish,” he admitted, “but I guess it makes people feel better about their pasts and futures.”

“I see,” Erwin mused, drinking his tea, his large finger barely fitting through the hole in the handle.

“I could help you burn some slips tonight,” Levi told him, trying to make the invitation sound casual despite that aching urge in his chest to keep the man in his presence for as long as possible. “It’s always better done with a witch’s blessing.”

“That’s very kind,” Erwin replied, smiling, “but I couldn’t possibly inconvenience you.”

“You wouldn’t be,” Levi insisted. “I could help you understand the custom.”

Erwin took a moment to think, his eyes regarding Levi solemnly. “Thank you,” he finally answered. “If you’re sure it won’t be a nuisance I would be happy to take you up on that offer.”

“You’re never a nuisance to me,” Levi told the man who looked surprised – how Levi hated seeing that expression, that confession of loneliness he longed to ease – but pleased.

“It’s very kind of you to say so,” said Erwin, “and I’d like you to know I feel similarly. Your presence is always appreciated. Or rather _I_ appreciate it, and more than appreciate, really. It is… Or what I mean is that I enjoy your company. Very much.”

Levi could feel that blush on his cheeks again as he drank the last of his tea – it tasted like pure, liquid honey and nearly made him shudder.

“Thank you,” he muttered. “And… You know… The same.”

They fell quiet for a long while, long enough for Levi to further examine Erwin’s words. He tried to find hints on the man’s face through means of inconspicuous glances, but it seemed to reveal nothing. He could sense so many things but nowadays it was nigh impossible to tell which one of the feelings he picked up on was his and which Erwin’s, and he could never tell if he sensed what the man felt or rather what he wished the man would feel. There was affection, of course – they were friends, Levi didn’t doubt that – but whenever he tried to look beyond it, Levi found he was only staring at his own frustration.

Farlan returned shortly after the closing of the shop and they all had dinner in the small kitchen, a rabbit stew with parsnips and carrots. Farlan and Isabel didn’t seem disturbed by the addition to their party – by then Erwin was something of a regular, after all – but Levi thought his presence made them more boisterous, and they questioned him incessantly about the ways of the Capital. He didn’t interfere with the conversation until he noticed Farlan’s questions about the famous Courtesans’ District making Erwin noticeably uncomfortable.

“How many prayer slip would you say we have left?” he asked Farlan and Isabel.

“No more than a dozen,” Isabel replied, “though I always keep five extra ones just in case, which you can have if you’d like. What do you need them for?”

“I’m afraid they’re for me,” Erwin explained, “to burn before I leave tomorrow. I couldn’t say how many I’ll need, though.”

“Well that depends,” said Farlan, “on how many bad things you’ve done of late, Captain. How many lies you’ve told, how many crimes you’ve committed, and how many… immodest acts, if you catch my meaning. Since you’re not married they can be called into question.”

Levi watched the blush rising to Erwin’s cheeks and wondered how a man such as him could be so easily embarrassed by the implication; surely he had had his fun with many an admirer.

“He means with other people,” Isabel clarified, helpfully if not delicately. “Otherwise there’d not be enough prayer slips in the world.”

“Yes, well… I…” Erwin stopped to clear his throat. “I’m sure the dozen will do. I wouldn’t want to rob you of your reserve.”

“You don’t need to show them to anyone,” Levi told the man, “if you don’t want to.”

“Though it does help,” Farlan put in. “It makes the blessings more accurate.”

“Yes, well,” Erwin said again as Levi got up to clear the plates from the table. “We’ll see what I can think of to write down.”

After placing the dishes into the sink Levi gave Erwin the slips of parchment, leaving him at the kitchen table with a quill and a bottle of ink. Farlan and Isabel had gone to the magistrate’s home to help the family with similar proceedings – a concession made for the rich and powerful, though Levi admitted to a sense of relief for their absence. He started building a fire in the hearth, the large one in the kitchen rather than the ones in the shop, though their embers were still glowing and would have been easy to breathe to flame. It didn’t make much of a difference – and Levi barely believed in any of this nonsense to begin with – but they said a home hearth was best, as was a fire made with logs from an apple tree. He cleaned the fireplace thoroughly to remove any old ash – any remnants of earlier slips might confuse the spirits – before spending a good quarter of an hour looking for those apple tree logs they kept at the back of the woodshed for special ceremonies and rituals, the weddings and funerals of town leaders, times of emergencies.

When he returned he found Erwin had finished and screwed the stopper back onto the ink bottle; he had only used ten of the slips.

“In all honesty, I couldn’t remember anything more,” he told Levi as he started laying the logs in the hearth. “I assumed I shouldn’t bother writing down every white lie I told as a boy, or every penny I found on the street and put in my own pocket.”

“I doubt the spirits would be interested in that,” said Levi, striking a spark from a flint stone to catch the dry wood. “We should let them burn for a moment.”

He took a seat at the table as the kitchen started to fill with the fragrant scent of the burning logs, looking over at the two slips left over and feeling the urge to take one and write down that incident with the love potion again.

“Would you like to take a look at them?” Erwin asked to Levi’s surprise, a light rosy hue upon his cheeks.

He nodded and accepted the slips, which read like a strange little book into the man’s wrong-doings, though Levi found it difficult to believe they represented a lifetime’s worth of indiscretions. Some lies the man had told and clearly regretted, an irreplaceable book of his father’s he had borrowed and lost, a drunken folly during his years of training he had let someone else take the blame for. Not a single instance of indecency in the bunch. It made Levi glance quickly at the man and raised a question as far as his lips, but in the end he left it unuttered – perhaps that was why he had come for a love potion.

“This last one is a little vague,” he told the man instead, turning to look at the last slip which merely read: _Concealing the truth_.

“Ah, yes,” said Erwin, sounding embarrassed. “I’d rather leave it as it is nevertheless, if you don’t mind.”

“If it’s very personal you can write it down and not show it to me,” Levi replied.

“No, I’d rather not see it in writing,” Erwin declined. “Not tonight, at least.”

Levi looked at the man in silence for a moment and nodded, walking over to the fireplace to add a few logs to the flames. “You can throw them in now if you’d like,” he told the man.

Erwin got up from his seat and joined him, coming up to stand so close to him their arms were nearly touching. “All at once?”

Levi shook his head. “One at a time,” he replied, breathing in the scent of the apple tree smoke and the soap Erwin used to wash himself.

He started casting the parchment in the fire as Levi recited the blessings, stumbling over the words as his mind searched for focus, a point to guide his mind away from the thoughts now filling his mind, of Erwin’s hands on his body, of his tongue tasting his lips, of his mouth between his legs, invoking those urges Levi had thought belonging permanently to his past now and not his future. He watched Erwin’s fingers, deft and sure as they went through the prayer slips, imagining them tangled in his hair, stroking his flesh, opening him up for different sensations, more pressing and more intrusive but equally persuasive, equally harmonious with the intensity of his feelings for the man. Levi breathed in deeply, catching Erwin’s attention as the last of the slips was engulfed by the flames.

“Well,” Erwin whispered, his voice sounding hoarse. “That’s that then.”

A sudden sense of urgency gripped Levi, pressing on his chest and leaving him without breath. The war that had felt so distant just moments before seemed to suddenly enter the room; Levi could hear the boom of the cannons as they fired, could smell the sulphurous smoke as the screaming of the wounded drowned out the sound of the logs crackling with heat. He turned quickly to Erwin, looking up at his solemn expression and realising these might be his last moments with the man – even if he survived the war, who was to say he would return to the town, after all, when there was nothing here for him save for a lonely old witch whose acquaintance he had made due to an unfortunate encounter. When their eyes met Levi was aching to speak out, to explain that longing in his heart, that yearning for the man’s touch that was now turning painful as they stood side by side.

“I should go home,” Erwin said and though Levi thought to nod, he couldn’t. “Tomorrow will be an important day.”

They kept looking at each other and Levi wanted to curse the fact that nothing passed between them, nothing he could identify and grab a hold of, just a moment of intensity before Erwin looked away and extended his hand.

“I wish you all the best,” he said as Levi took the hand in his. “I hope you know how sincerely I mean it.”

Levi nodded mutely, finding no words to express any of the tumult in his heart. He walked Erwin to the door, hearing himself say only some insipid courtesy before the man took his leave and Levi returned to the kitchen, filling the basin and washing the dishes without thinking. It was only when he returned to the shop that all the things he had wanted to say but couldn’t started to find their forms in words, phrases that would have expressed it all despite their simplicity and honesty.

In an instant Levi was hit with a panic that drove him to pull open the drawers behind the counter in a mad frenzy, to throw their contests on the floor as he looked and looked – for what? There were too many things, too many trinkets and rolls of parchment and old coins and sticks of incense and crystals and beads and soap moulds and pestles and mortars and spices and seeds and salts. And too many drawers, too many boxes, too many things he had never thrown away, too many things he’d forgotten he had. His hands started to shake as he pulled open the cupboards and swiped their contents onto the cool stones, fingers brushing through everything once before he moved on to the next and another.

Until he found it.

It lay heavily on the palm of his hand when he removed it from its tattered box: a simple green stone set in a circle of solid gold. Heaviness was good, especially with solidity and age; this was no mere trinket, this was personal and treasured. It had been his mother’s, and that would make it stronger – magic, strong magic like this demanded a sacrifice, something of the self to enforce itself. Levi closed his fingers gently around the gem, walking across the shop and taking a piece of charcoal from the edge of the hearth. He couldn’t use chalk, not for this; black was a much stronger colour.

Levi drew the circles with care, every one connected and as symmetrical as he could make it, every rune and sign strong and clear. He placed the stone in the middle and his coal-stained hand on top of it, speaking the incantations but embellishing, adding confessions and visions and secret wants, fears and wishes and hope. He whispered them into the mineral, into the gold, brought his lips close and let out that desperation: he could bear a lifetime of loneliness, a forever of wishing for something else than what fate had made of his life, but whatever was to be Erwin had to live, he had to survive, had to have time to find the happiness he so deserved.

He was on his knees until dawn when the departure of the garrison drew the people of the town to the gates. Levi walked through the throng that parted before him, gazing wordlessly at the witch in their midst, his uncombed hair and soot-stained hands and face, the dark smears of charcoal on his lips. His eyes searched frantically, darting between the blue jackets and wagons until he saw Erwin, sitting tall on the back of a horse, leading a column of men. Their eyes met and the man stopped, stepping down from the saddle as Levi approached.

“I made this for you,” he said, handing over the amulet, the green colour of the stone nearly hidden under a layer of soot. “It will keep you safe.”

Erwin took the treasure in his hand, his thumb moving over the gem. “I don’t know what to say,” he admitted, looking into Levi’s eyes.

“Then don’t say anything,” Levi told him, knowing there was nothing he could hear now that would help the aching in his chest. “Just promise me you won’t lose it.”

“I promise,” Erwin said, closing his fingers around Levi’s heart.

 

* * *

 

Erwin peered down at the map, his eyes stinging with lack of sleep as he moved the miniature cannons around, trying to find the perfect position for them closer to the city. Those catapults on the walls were the problem. Antiquated as they were they had proved a surprisingly precise weapon; the mathematicians of the Sand Prince’s court were exceedingly clever at calculating arches and distances. They had had cannons too of course to begin with, but their reserve of gunpowder had run out swiftly and it seemed the Prince could not draw back any of his forces to help produce more. The Emperor was more in luck; having secured his trade routes and contracts to the east, his armies were in no short supply, an advantage the importance of which could hardly be exaggerated.

And still the siege lasted.

They had surrounded the city bearing the Prince’s name near half a year ago, had lost countless men against those walls, thinning out the city’s armouries one bullet and cannonball at a time. They had fresh supplies near every week – the Emperor thought this campaign to be of primary importance – but still the walls stood, and still those ancient catapults rained heavy stones upon their cannons, crushing them under their weight. The terrain was a problem on its own right – rocky and bare, a struggle for the horses and for the transportation of the artillery – but the weather was another matter entirely; blazing hot during the day, cruelly cold during the night, draining the men of morale faster than the consistently bad quality of their daily portions of gruel, crackers and dried fruits. After a month on the food Erwin had started to have dreams of Levi’s potions and the relief they would have brought him.

That was another thing Erwin hated about the siege. Earlier in the campaign there had been no time for idleness – he had fallen asleep in the saddle more often than not – and no time for the thoughts that came with it. But here things were different, months of nothing but sitting around and waiting for the city to surrender, making the odd attack here and there to attempt breaking down the gates. The men grew more restless the longer they had nothing to do, and with the camp being prepared and expanded months ago, most of Erwin’s tasks now included keeping them all in line. It was not a pleasant task, nor did it occupy his mind enough to keep his thoughts away from other, more pleasant if more painful, things.

He pushed his hand in his pocket and pulled out the amulet that gleamed dully on the palm of his hand in the dim light of the oil lamp on his desk. He would often take it out at moments like this before going to bed just to look at it and remember the day he left, the tear in his being that their parting had caused. He could never forget how Levi had looked, face smeared with ashes though Erwin couldn’t possibly understand why, the man being so strict about cleanliness. His hair had been unkempt, like torn at in frustration, and the amulet had still held the warmth of his hand. Sometimes Erwin thought he could still feel that heat, though it must have been nothing but his imagination.

“Major Smith?”

A voice called from outside his tent, rousing him from his reverie and making him drop the amulet on the desk.

“Yes.”

Captain Zacharius stepped in carrying a wooden cup in each of his large hands. He placed the other one on the desk in front of Erwin before pulling a flask out of his pocket and filling the cup halfway with an amber-coloured liquor.

“I should report you for possession of prohibited goods,” Erwin told him before taking a gulp from his cup; the ban on spirits in the camp was supposed to be absolute, to avoid a multitude of problems excessive drinking brought with it. It was a shared joke they had, and Captain Zacharius didn’t omit his own contribution, a quiet sniff of laughter.

“How do our positions look?” the man asked him now, making Erwin sigh.

“The same as yesterday,” he admitted. “And the day before that, and the day before that.”

“Useless,” the Captain said, condensing into one word the way Erwin had felt for going on two months. “We need those long range cannons. Without them we can’t do anything.”

“I sent another order for them yesterday,” Erwin let him know, “but the Emperor won’t move them for as long as his own camp remains threatened.”

“What about the ones General Zackly has?” the man reminded again.

“It would take too long to get them over the desert,” said Erwin, joining the Captain in looking down at the map. “The mountain passes offer too many opportunities for ambush, and going around them would take months.”

Captain Zacharius hummed in agreement, sniffing at the air in the tent in his own curious way until something else on the desk seemed to catch his attention. He picked up the amulet hesitantly, weighing it in his hand.

“What’s this?” he asked Erwin, who almost minded the familiarity when it came to this, even though months of sharing duties had made them very close.

“It’s an amulet to keep me safe,” Erwin explained, feeling suddenly embarrassed, though he couldn’t say whether it was because the magic in the stone seemed childish or because the object was so personal and intimate. “A witch gave it to me before I left.”

“I’m sorry, I mistook it for a trinket,” the Captain said, handing the amulet over. “I didn’t realise it held such value.”

Erwin gave the object one last look before placing it back in his pocket. “It’s fine,” he told the man, “though you are right, it holds great value to me.”

Captain Zacharius walked over to Erwin’s bed with a few long strides and sat down on it heavily, sighing as he stretched out his long legs. “There was a witch in our village when I was a little boy,” he said, taking a sip from his cup. “An old woman. We were all terrified of her, of course.”

Erwin laughed at that. “Well, I’m sure there are those in town who are scared of our Messrs Ackerman and Church,” he told the man cheerfully, “though mostly they provoke nothing but the greatest respect and admiration.”

“I’ve heard witches can be tricky,” the Captain went on, “and dangerous when mistreated.”

“I do not doubt it,” Erwin agreed. “I have experienced first-hand the power of their remedies. Luckily I have been spared the reverse. Though I must admit, it took us a while to start seeing eye to eye on things.”

Erwin thought about the night in Levi’s shop, how sitting down for that one cup of tea had changed everything, made them see each other as people rather than as some imaginary adversaries. That one night had brought them so close, made them able to share things. Erwin liked to think the benefit of that had been mutual, that Levi had received something from their friendship, even if his affection had not been as deep as Erwin’s, as he had feared since his departure.

He turned again to look at the map on the table in front of him; only a handful of miles stood between their camp and the city, but breaching that small distance through the strength of arms was as unthinkable now as it had been on the day they had arrived. It seemed to Erwin the whole matter was a puzzle that needed solving, that needed some solution that would most likely appear much simpler in hindsight than it did at present. He peered down at the worn parchment, knitting his brows as he turned the problem this way and that in his mind.

“You shouldn’t waste your time,” Captain Zacharius told him quietly. “The best plan is to wait for those cannons. We’re not the ones lacking supplies, after all. The city will be all the weaker once we finally attack.”

Erwin agreed quietly, still thinking about that cup of tea.

That night the plan burst into his mind and as he had expected, it seemed much simpler after its arrival. Despite its simplicity – or perhaps precisely because of it – his commanders in the camp were disinclined to grant him permission to put it into action, only agreeing when he promised to assume full responsibility for its execution. Captain Zacharius joined him despite the danger and Erwin’s objections and in the end he was grateful not to have to do it all alone.

They rode out of the camp under the Emperor’s colours early one morning, crossing the distance to the gates of the city in a matter of hours. They were greeted with suspicion – Erwin had assumed nothing else – but admitted beyond the walls as envoys after someone had been brought in to translate their matter to their native tongue. By his own telling this interpreter had spent several years in the Emperor’s court in the Capital, though the exact nature of his work there was never made clear to Erwin.

As they rode through the sand-covered streets of Alu-šut-Šamas Erwin began to see the consequences of the siege in more detail than he could attest to being comfortable with; people lying lifeless by the buildings, skeletal legs sticking out of the cotton robes they wore, old women sitting on the steps of houses with their faces covered, children crowding around them, their skin-and-bone hands outstretched for the chance piece of bread they might throw down at them. There were no stray dogs or cats about, though Erwin had heard these desert cities to be famous for their abundance, and it took no wondering to realise where the animals had gone. On their way from the gates to the palace at the heart of the city, Erwin didn’t see so much as a rat.

The closer they got to the fortifications surrounding the Sand Prince’s winter home, the more like an ordinary city it all started to look, showing no sign of trouble or of anything but its former glory as soon as the bronze doors of the palace swung shut behind them. Far were the skull-like faces from here, where people still wore their usual opulent purple garbs embroidered with gold thread while strolling around gardens, kept in bloom using water without which the commoners were dying in the streets. Something within Erwin resisted the idea at first, but somewhere beyond his unwillingness to admit it he knew had the Capital met the same fate, there would have been no remarkable difference.

They were shown into an audience chamber, a cavernous room with a domed ceiling held up by pillars in the form of snakes, their scales carved from coloured stones; lapis lazuli, malachite, turquoise. In the middle sat a low table made of ebony around which they were served strong coffee and refreshments while for a fortnight Erwin attempted to negotiate the city’s surrender, even securing an allowance for the high officials to send one of their ambassadors to the Sand Prince himself under the Emperor’s protection. For a moment it seemed his plan had hope of success, but at the last moment the High Priestess of Alu-šut-Šamas stepped in, declaring the surrender of the city to the northern barbarians would be an affront to the gods. On the following day they were turned away at the gates, and Erwin’s thoughts lay bitterly on the starving children, many of whom now faced an even grimmer fate.

The long-range cannons broke the city in three days, but Erwin’s own will to carry out the task was lost much faster than that.

 

* * *

 

Levi picked up the thumb-sized piece that his bar of soap had been reduced to and rubbed it to a good lather between his hands before rinsing away the blood and filth and the desert dirt that the wind blew constantly into their tents. He had lost another one, a young man barely Isabel’s age whose chest had been pierced by a bullet, and the boy’s calls for his mother seemed to still linger in his ears as he fought the soap under his fingernails to remove the last dried flakes of red. There was that reminder again, piercing through his mind: if he’d had more supplies, something to brew his potions with, something to give the boy for his pain at least. But the dry earth yielded nothing but dust and rocks and venomous crawling things the sting or bite of which could kill you as quickly and surely as a bullet – sometimes even faster.

“I’m getting some food,” he told the officer loitering by the tent door. “You’ll know where to find me.”

The Lieutenant nodded curtly and Levi stepped out, blinking for a moment in the sudden blazing brightness before setting out across the sand toward the kitchen tent, though the thought of the dried meat, lentil porridge and stale water they were given day after day was nearly enough to make him lose his appetite. He received his portion after a short wait and sat down on the ground near the wall of the tent; they had chopped the tables up for firewood several weeks ago. That bastard Zackly was going to squeeze out every last drop of their supplies even if it meant they’d freeze to death, Levi didn’t doubt for a second.

The order had come almost a year after the garrison’s departure; the Emperor wanted all of the witches still residing on his lands to lend their service to the war, which clearly hadn’t gone as well as he had hoped. Erwin had said it would be over quickly – which Levi had learned to be a very relative concept when it came to warfare – due to the imbalance in the size of their armies, but the people of the southern regions knew their land and the ways to make the most of its difficult climate, whereas the Emperor’s soldiers grew quickly exhausted under the blazing sun. Or so Levi had been told, and after five months in the desert it was another thing he didn’t doubt for a second.

They had left Isabel in charge of the shop; the order had only applied to fully trained witches, and Levi thanked their luck every day that Isabel had still been missing a month’s worth of experience. He had travelled with Farlan all the way to the Capital – two days of breathing in that stench of smoke and sewage had reminded Levi more than adequately of why he had kept his distance from the place – from where they were sent onward. Levi had thought the two months it had taken them to get to the edge of the desert to be the worst he’d ever experience; rowdy soldiers – he had cast more curses than he cared to count – minimal opportunities for washing, the endless walking under the searing sun. But he had soon learned it was only the beginning, and when the wasteland had surrounded them and the battles had begun and he had spent a week up to his elbows in blood and piss and shit, Levi thought back to the days of marching and the taunting of the garrison of bastards with an almost wistful nostalgia.

The post arrived – the first time in a fortnight, by his reckoning at least – while he was still struggling with his porridge. A letter from Farlan, sealed shut with a simple spell Levi broke with a few mumbled words.

 

> _Dear Levi,_
> 
> _the camp has grown empty as the troops have been mobilised. The Emperor himself has ridden out to assist in the siege of Alu-šut-Šamas and they say once the siege is broken, the war will come to an end. The fighting around the city has been fierce, or so they tell us. Some of the more badly wounded pass this way on their journey to the Capital and they talk of terrible things._
> 
> _I heard from Isabel who says the town is the same as ever. The Magistrate heard his son had died. Isabel offered to perform the ceremonies but he insisted on bringing in Miss Hazlehurst from Lichendon. She stayed at the shop during her visit, said it was very well managed and to send you her regards._
> 
> _The rose bush is making new leaves again and the roots are starting to spread toward the fireplace. Isabel does not know what to do with it. Said she will leave it as is for when you come back._
> 
> _Jan’s legs are getting better. It seems Isabel finally found what was missing from that salve – rosehip, if you can believe it. He has been able to get around town for the first time in months. I am sorry to have missed it._
> 
> _Last week I was finally able to get new supplies from the Capital and ever since then I have been able to do more for my patients again. They told us the desert camps have not had new supplies in months now. How do you manage? Is the local flora proving useful?_
> 
> _I do hope this whole dreadful business will be behind us soon and that we will be free to return home._
> 
> _Yours in friendship,_
> 
> _Farlan_

Levi folded the letter back into the envelope just as the cook announced tea. He got himself a cup, though the brew was bitter as shit, some wax-covered leaves picked from the thorny, shrivelled bushes that grew around the camp, soaked in boiling water just long enough for them to let out flavour. It gave the drinker a relaxed sensation if drunk in excess, Levi knew, which was why they were all allowed only a cup each.

As he sat on the sand they started to gather around him. Petra came first, still in her blood-soaked apron which she discarded only when she saw his displeased expression. She hadn’t slept; one of the camp followers had had a difficult labour that had lasted for nearly a day. The mother had been very strict about allowing men in the room, though if anyone asked Levi he would have said it was a bit too late for that now.

“A healthy girl,” she told Levi when he asked, “though rather on the thin side.”

“She’ll be a shy one,” Levi replied, “taking this long to come out.”

Petra nodded over her porridge as the rest of them started coming in, Eld and Gunther first, followed soon after by Oluo. They sat in a haphazard circle, exchanging a few words here and there, stopping every once in a while to ask Levi a question, sometimes one they had already asked before. They had all come to the camp after him and he had shown them how things worked. The whole thing had reminded him of Isabel and made him homesick to a point that approached melancholy, but he had carried on with it regardless. None of them was a witch, just recruits from all over the Empire, young people wishing to see the world who had ended up seeing too much of it. Students – that’s what they were called in the cities they came from – of modern medicines and surgeries, and Levi thought they had all taught each other something new here. They were good at what they did, all of them, especially now that the novelty of it had worn off and they had learned to embrace the routine.

“Real cheese,” Gunther started their usual round after a longer silence. “The hard kind, with big holes in it.”

They all agreed in a mumble, and the ones still eating were even less impressed with their portions afterward.

“Ale,” Eld continued, taking a sip of his tea and grimacing. “What I wouldn’t give for a mug of cold, foaming, dark brown ale.”

“Ale is a peasants’ drink,” Oluo put in haughtily. “Wine is what I miss. Year of the death of the thirty-first Empress, best vintage you can still find at a reasonable price in the Capital.”

“All this talk about food,” Petra huffed. “Do you want to know what I miss? Proper equipment! Or something to sharpen our lancets and other tools with. If I have to amputate one more limb with that dull useless bone saw I’m going to walk back to the Capital and complain to every officer I see until I get a new one.”

“Why do you always think about other people?” Oluo groaned. “It makes the rest of us look bad.”

“I think we make ourselves look bad, Oluo,” Gunther commented.

“What do you miss, Levi?” Petra asked him next. “What do you miss about your home?”

Levi took a moment to think of all the things he did miss: Isabel’s mischievous cackle, Farlan’s fretting about the shop, the people in the town who trusted him, confided in him, came to him for help. The feeling of being needed, of making a difference, of being a part of something, of knowing where you belong. The winding alleys with their worn cobbled stones, the squeaking shutters in the windows, the dull shine of the floor boards in the shop right after he had cleaned them, cleaning the ashes out of the fireplaces, mixing his blends of tea behind the counter. The scent of burning apple tree logs in the kitchen, the soft rustle of prayer slips, sensing the strength of Erwin’s body just from standing next to him, imagining what it could do, imagining the man’s arms around him, guiding him, knowing him.

“The cold,” Levi finally said as a drop of sweat fell down the back of his head.

That night Levi had a strange dream in which he was sleeping, a deep slumber from which he stirred suddenly and sat up on his mattress and looked across the tent. In the corner sat Death in the guise of an old woman, grey skinned and wrinkled but strong like a man in his prime. She met Levi’s eyes, smiling as he nodded politely.

“Witch,” said Death; her voice was deep and forceful. “Do you think me fooled by your trick?”

Levi shook his head. “I was not aware I had played one,” he told the old woman, looking into her eyes, misty with time and stars. “I know your power. I know not to test it.”

“Yes,” she said, her thin lips parting for a sigh. “I took so many things from you when you most needed them.”

Levi watched as her likeness changed to that of a young man with dark hair like Levi’s, his nose and his stature. The man looked back at him mournfully, sitting cross-legged on the sand.

“He should not have tried to cross those mountains.” The voice that came out of his mouth was not his. “They told him it was too dangerous. It was the cold that killed him. It made him fall asleep.”

“A peaceful parting,” said Levi, and the man nodded.

“Not so for her,” said Death, turning back into a woman, younger and more frail, with brown hair and dark sunken eyes. “How she fought against it! For your sake, you understand.”

Levi nodded but couldn’t speak.

“How we all do foolish things for our children,” his mother told him, sitting suddenly by his side, her hand pressed against his cheek. “My daughter should have your prayers now. Do not waste them on an old woman. I have had too much of them of late.”

In the blink of an eye his mother was gone and the crone back on her place in the corner; Levi could still feel the warmth of her hand upon his face.

“She liked the gem, I think,” Death told him, sounding pensive. “It reminded her of a lover she once had.”

“I thought it suited him,” said Levi, thinking of the weight of it on his palm, the solidity, the value.

“Yes,” the old woman replied, her expression growing mournful. “You know how magic works. A sacrifice was required.”

“Take what you must,” he told Death. “I meant what I said.”

“My dear boy,” she sighed. “It’s not you who must pay the price.”

Levi felt his eyes closing against his will and the world growing dark though he tried to see the old woman as she leaned over him.

“She heard you, my child,” whispered Death. “Know this, and rest.”

In the morning Levi woke to the sounds of the battalion’s return and their rowdy cheers drove the dream from his mind; the war was over. 

 

* * *

 

Erwin woke to a knock on his door, feeling like it had interrupted some important thought or some memory that was slow in returning to him.

“Major Smith?” a woman called out as he sat up in his bed. “May I come in?”

Still this ridiculous pretence of decency. Hadn’t they all seen him in the nude half a dozen times by now?

“Yes,” he called out gruffly, moving the book he had fallen asleep reading from his lap to the nightstand. He had dozed off in the middle of the day again; hardly surprising, given how little there was to do around here.

The nurse entered timidly and to Erwin it seemed to take her five steps toward his bed to find her courage. She continued briskly to the windows to draw back the curtains and push them open to let in the fresh air. Erwin could smell the jasmine blooming in the garden and hear the loud cries of the parakeets flitting from tree to tree in the woods around the sanatorium; neither brought him much comfort.

“There’s a visitor for you, sir,” the nurse told him, rushing to make his bed as he got up.

“Is my mother back so soon?” he asked – she had only been here the day before – but the nurse shook her head.

“An officer,” she said. “Lieutenant colonel Dok, he said his name was.”

So Nile had been promoted as well, more so even than Erwin himself. Well, it wasn’t surprising. The eastern campaign had enjoyed great success throughout the war.

“I need to freshen up then,” Erwin said out loud. “Could someone let him know I’ll be with him in a moment?”

“Of course, sir,” the nurse replied, smoothing out the wrinkles on his covers. “Will you be needing any help with–”

“No, I won’t,” he told her, softening his brusque tone with a quiet, “thank you, nurse.”

She took her leave as Erwin entered the bathroom, removing his clothes clumsily and piling them onto the floor; they would be gone by the time he got back. He filled the glass bowl in front of the mirror with warm water before dipping in a washcloth, running it over his body to dispel the faint layer of sweat brought on by sleep. He rubbed at the beard now covering his cheeks and frowned. It couldn’t be helped, his hand still lacked the dexterity required for shaving, and he resented the nurses helping him with the matter. Having someone close, even for something so innocent as that, made him uneasy; the few times they had assisted him with bathing had been quite uncomfortable enough.

It took him a moment to find something to wear; avoiding the uniform had become a nuisance. Buttons were tricky, laces nigh impossible, but he managed to get into a pair of breeches and boots. A jacket wasn’t necessary; such an informal occasion, just friends having tea, and the weather was pleasantly warm. Besides, he really didn’t want to fight with any more buttons for the day – pinning up the sleeve of his shirt felt like enough exercise in any case.

And of course Nile was wearing a formal uniform, complete with epaulettes; looking at him Erwin felt about as civilised as a common highwayman as he entered the glass-domed veranda.

“Erwin,” Nile exclaimed, standing up though Erwin was barely past the door. He could see the man’s eyes shifting back and forth between his face and the missing limb, and something about that made him want to shield the stump of his arm with his left hand.

“Nile,” Erwin replied, realising it must have been over a year ago when they last met; suppose it accounted for the odd formality. He extended his hand which the man shook clumsily and Erwin was ashamed to admit he liked it, that someone else was ungraceful for once.

They sat down at the small table the nurses had laid with a pot of tea and two cups on saucers. The veranda was empty save for them and a few green parakeets jumping from table to table, looking for crumbs. The peach-coloured glow of the afternoon sun made Nile’s hair appear almost red as it bounced off the baked-earth tiles of the floor. No matter how much he resented his stay here, Erwin had to admit he enjoyed this part of the building, just for the light if for no other reason. There was something calming about sitting at a table like this, having tea; probably a memory from his childhood.

“How have you been?” Nile asked him, hurrying to pour the tea when he saw Erwin reaching for the handle. “I heard you were injured and wanted to write, but no one seemed to know where you had been taken.”

“I’ve been here for several months now,” Erwin told him, taking a sip of his tea; everything here had jasmine in it. “They brought me here from the Emperor’s camp.”

“So how have you been?” Nile asked him again. “It seems like a good place.”

“It is,” Erwin replied, wishing suddenly that everyone would stop tip-toeing around it. “I’m well looked after here.”

“I’m glad to hear it,” said Nile, drinking his tea hastily and burning his tongue. “And I’m glad to have finally found you. Things were so chaotic at the end of it.”

“I can imagine.”

It was all he could say about it, after all.

“Marie got here a week ago. Finally,” the man went on. “I’ve been getting the house ready. She met my parents a few days ago.”

“I’m sure they adore her,” Erwin responded, making Nile smile.

“How could they not?” he said warmly.

“So you’ve decided to stay here?” Erwin asked, drinking his tea, thinking he could taste something familiar in it, something beyond the ever-present jasmine.

Nile nodded. “I’ve accepted a position at court,” he explained, looking suddenly embarrassed, like he was flaunting something in front of Erwin to his distress, “as one of the Emperor’s advisors in matters of war.”

“Congratulations,” Erwin said, smiling; the first genuine one in weeks, or so it seemed to him. “I can think of no other person better suited for the task.”

“You flatter me,” Nile protested, “but the truth is, I am eager to fulfil my duty in this manner, not least of all because it places me back in the Capital. You know I never fit in well in the north.”

“I suppose it requires a rather specific disposition,” Erwin mused as hazy memories floated to his consciousness, of odd customs and strange talk. “Their culture is hardly readily understandable for those not born into it.”

“Not to mention the nightmare-ish weather,” Nile continued, shivering at a memory Erwin had lost and growing more serious, glancing again at the empty, pinned-up sleeve. “Do you know what you’re going to do next?”

Of course; active duty was no longer a possibility, even as an officer. Erwin had realised it as soon as he had woken up in the sick tent, in pain and incomplete.

“I’ve heard your name mentioned many a time,” Nile told him, lowering his voice. “Granted, I have mentioned it several times myself, but if I were you, I wouldn’t be surprised if someone approached you about it, and soon. The war left many positions to be filled.”

“Indeed,” Erwin agreed, pouring himself another cup of tea, thinking about the man’s words. A place at court was the pinnacle of any respectable career, the true measure for the height of any man’s success. Erwin sipped at his tea, deep in thought; that familiar flavour again, he couldn’t put his finger on it but it reminded him of something, something very–

“Marie told me the witches had both come back before she left,” Nile interrupted his thoughts. “I remember you befriending one of them during your stay, so I thought you’d like to know.”

“Did I really?” Erwin asked, frowning as he remembered the little shop and its strange little owner, and the debacle with the so-called love potion. “I’m sorry, my memory isn’t what it used to be.”

“Yes, well,” said Nile, sounding alarmed. “I won’t pretend like it doesn’t please me that for my children they’ll all be just tales and fables.”

“Marie will make sure they won’t be,” Erwin reminded him, making him sigh.

“I suppose she will, heavens help me,” he uttered, turning to Erwin with a sheepish expression. “She was very sad to hear about your situation.”

Erwin felt like lifting his left hand to massage at the stump, but resisted. “You should tell her not to worry,” he told his friend. “I am perfectly fine.”

“She cares about you a great deal,” Nile went on, and something within Erwin still hurt at the words. “In fact she suggested you stay with us once you move on from here. Until you feel better, or as long as you want. I’d like it very much as well, and we certainly have the room.”

Erwin smiled despite the pain brought on by the image of joining the two for breakfast, watching them embrace each other and share kisses over Marie’s swollen belly. “You’re both very kind,” he said, “but I couldn’t. I must ask you not to question me further about my reasons for declining the offer, as generous as it is.”

Nile looked at him for a moment before nodding and leaving the subject, to Erwin’s relief; they both knew, of course, so there was nothing more that needed saying about it.

“Mark my words though,” Nile continued. “Someone will visit you with an offer, and soon, if the world still works how I think it does.”

“We shall see,” Erwin replied, drinking the rest of his tea; that flavour still eluded him and he let it go, though reluctantly.

Nile turned out to be right; the week had barely ended when a nurse came in to Erwin’s room announcing another visitor with a title: General Darius Zackly, no less, and Erwin admitted himself a touch surprised that they would send someone with such a rank. He took care to look presentable, even asking one of the nurses to help him shave off that ghastly beard and donning his uniform; a little tighter than he remembered but then, he had enjoyed good meals and very little exercise for weeks.

They had set the tea in the private office of the sanatorium’s Superior where Erwin found the General already waiting. He saluted the man, his first time in months, and it felt wrong from the start. The man acknowledged it with a nod before inviting Erwin to take a seat.

“I’m not one to beat around the bush, so to speak,” General Zackly began. “I’d rather not waste time on being delicate about the matter, if that’s fine by you.”

“Of course, sir,” Erwin said, feeling relieved as he poured himself a cup of tea; the General refused when he offered. “I understand the situation. With the injuries I sustained my returning to my earlier position as Major is impossible.”

“Indeed,” Zackly confirmed without any apology to his voice. “I am sad to say your days of active duty are over. The best I can offer is a permanent position in the reserve, something administrative under the rank of Lieutenant colonel. I’m sure you understand.”

“Yes,” Erwin confirmed in short, taking a sip of his tea; the flavour was there again, he could even smell it in the steam that rose to his face, but what was it? “I had thought as much, sir.”

“You would have your choice of location, of course,” the General continued. “It’s the least I can do.”

“I appreciate it. Thank you, General,” Erwin replied. “But something tells me this is not all you’ve come here to say.”

“No, it is not,” Zackly confirmed his suspicions. “I have been trusted by the Emperor to make you an alternative offer. Your decision to accept the position would sever your ties to the military, which explains my involvement.”

“I see,” said Erwin, drinking the tea; it was right at the tip of his tongue but he couldn’t name it, something so familiar. If he could just stop–

“Your talents have not gone unnoticed,” Zackly informed him curtly. “The Emperor was impressed by your attempts to negotiate the surrender of Alu-šut-Šamas, and would therefore like to offer you a position as his ambassador in the Sand Prince’s court.”

“A very generous offer, sir,” Erwin commented, his mind still more on the tea. “I am flattered by the Emperor’s faith in my abilities, of course.”

“I’m sure you comprehend the situation,” the General said. “Tensions are still high and the much needed spirit of forgiveness–”

“Would be best exemplified by someone who has much to forgive for. Yes, I understand,” Erwin finished for the man and sipped at his tea again, frowning. “Only a fool would refuse an offer like that.”

“You don’t strike me as one,” Zackly told him, “but then I only know you from your records.”

“Yes,” Erwin replied distractedly, jumping up suddenly as he heard footsteps in the hallway. He walked to the door and opened it, calling for the nurse who was hurrying along with a pile of neatly folded sheets in his arms.

“Is there something you need, Major?” he asked Erwin politely, though his voice was not entirely free of concern; clearly he hadn’t been the easiest of patients.

“The tea,” Erwin said, trying to make sense of what he wanted to know. “I must know what’s in it.”

“I couldn’t say right at this minute,” the nurse told him, sounding confused, “but I’ll be happy to ask the kitchen staff for you, sir.”

“Thank you,” Erwin said, feeling suddenly relieved. “If it’s not too much trouble.”

“Whatever eases your mind, sir,” the man assured him, continuing on his way down the corridor as Erwin returned to the room.

“I’m sorry,” he apologised to Zackly before taking a seat again. “Where were we?”

“Discussing whether you’re a fool or not,” the General told him, looking suddenly more serious than he had before. “It would be understandable if you felt a touch off balance at present. An experience like yours would rattle most anyone.”

“I’m sure it would,” Erwin agreed, wondering somewhere in the back of his mind why he was so reluctant to accept, “though the fact is I don’t feel particularly rattled. You must understand there’s a lot to consider, in both of the offers you’ve presented me with, sir.”

“Of course,” said Zackly, “and the Emperor is willing to give you until the end of the week to make your decision. But the matter is pressing, and I won’t pretend it isn’t.”

“Nor should you, sir,” Erwin told the man, tasting the tea again. “Oh, if I could just remember what that is…”

“I must ask whether you’re feeling quite well, Major,” the General said. “I had heard that your memory–”

“I have been assured that it is returning,” Erwin explained briefly. “I remember the war perfectly in any case, which is all that I ought to need should I accept the Emperor’s offer.”

“Indeed,” Zackly muttered falling quiet as Erwin filled his cup again, drinking the tea distractedly. “Perhaps I ought to leave you to consider your options then.”

“Perhaps it would be for the best,” Erwin agreed, standing up to shake the man’s hand; he had started to dislike it. “I will inform you of my decision in a few days.”

“So it is agreed,” the General stated, marching rigidly to the door which flew open before he had a chance to reach for the handle.

“I’m sorry, sir,” the nurse from before apologised, looking from Zackly to Erwin. “I have the ingredients of the tea for you, sir.”

“Yes?” Erwin asked, feeling anxious and eager and, for some inexplicable reason, afraid.

“It’s a common blend here,” the man told him. “The tea itself is a delicate green variety grown in the Ingrim province, but we make the blend here. The flavourings are jasmine, elderflower, lemongrass and rosehip.”

“Rosehip,” Erwin repeated quietly. “Yes. That must be it.”

In a trance-like state he returned to the table, pouring out the last drops of the tea from the pot. He drank it slowly, savouring every drop, tasting the jasmine, the elderflower, the lemongrass – and yes, the rosehip, that was it, the one he couldn’t remember, the one he felt he needed to the most.

“Why?” he asked himself in a whisper. “Why does it matter so much? What is it that I can’t remember? What could possibly be so important?”

“Sir? Sir if you’re not feeling well–” the nurse said behind him, but he lifted his hand to silence the man.

“Roses,” he muttered. “Something about roses, something unusual, something…” It seemed like a voice had suddenly pierced through, a different one, and him left mouthing the words. “That bloody bush keeps making rosehips every two days now. If you couldn’t make some many bloody things out of them I swear I’d pull that thing out of my floor with my bare hands.”

It all came back like a crash of a wave, flooding his mind with scents and sounds and images, feelings too strong for words. He remembered everything, the night of the wedding, that kindness he hadn’t known to expect, the way their paths had kept crossing afterward, like guided by some stranger force. They had had tea together most every day, the man had always known exactly which one Erwin would prefer, though he seldom seemed to have enjoyed it himself. They had shared stories, had grown close, closer than Erwin had ever allowed anyone. There was something about the softness of Levi’s voice, something about the infinite reserve of thoughtfulness beyond that sullen exterior that Erwin had come to yearn for, that had made him sad to leave. Levi had looked so strange that morning, coming to see him off, giving him that amulet. He had promised not to lose it, Erwin realised, turning back to the nurse in agitation.

“When I came here,” he asked, nearly tripping over the words, “did I have an amulet with me? A green one, set in solid gold?”

“I don’t believe you did, sir,” the nurse told him, sounding ever more confused. “Are you sure you wouldn’t like to lie down, sir? You seem very unsettled.”

“Indeed,” General Zackly agreed firmly. “Perhaps this offer to return to work has come too soon for the current state of your health, Major.”

“My health is not the issue here, General,” Erwin told him, smiling suddenly in a way that seemed to alarm them both. “I’m afraid I made and broke a promise, and must return now to make amends. Therefore, I feel compelled to decline your offer.”

“I see,” said Zackly, frowning in consternation. “Which one?”

“Both of them,” Erwin replied cheerfully. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I must return to my room. I have many preparations to make for the journey.”

 

* * *

 

Levi couldn’t remember a time when he would have been more grateful to have Farlan and Isabel in his life than when he finally arrived back at the shop after a gruelling month of travelling, relieved beyond words to find there was a hot bath waiting for him upstairs, followed by a hearty supper and real tea, the strong dark kind he usually preferred in the mornings but was more than happy to drink before bed on this occasion. Farlan even managed to keep Isabel’s enthusiasm somewhat in check by reminding her there was ample time for questions the following day. She had that burn to travel, she was young and held that optimism that things could be better somewhere else. Or if not better then refreshingly different, at the very least.

That night Levi slept more soundly than in weeks, reminding himself of the scorching desert sun, the crowded trains and the open-topped wagon he had ridden in for the last twenty miles just to make his own bed feel more comfortable now that he was finally in it. He slept undisturbed through most of the following day, hearing nothing of the customers who visited the shop or of Isabel and Farlan going about their business in the house.

Farlan had arrived two weeks earlier, having been closer to the border and the Capital at the Emperor’s camp. The experience had left its mark on him, more so even than on Levi who began to notice the other man’s restlessness during the following weeks. After their lives had started to settle back into their previous routines, he started to spend more time away on his errands, sleeping at Jan the tailor’s home more often than not. It didn’t come as a surprise to Levi then when after the midsummer Farlan finally cleared his throat at the table and announced he had something he wished to say.

“Jan and I have been talking,” he said, looking worried but determined, “about the sort of future we want for ourselves.”

“One with lots of shagging no doubt,” Isabel muttered under her breath, “since that’s all you do lately.”

Levi gave her a gentle nudge under the table as Farlan continued.

“You know I have loved living here,” the man went on, “and I have loved sharing my life with you both, and helping with this shop. But lately I feel like–”

“Like you need something of your own,” Levi finished for him. “Something that is yours and his.”

Farlan looked at him over the table, blinking to keep his eyes from growing misty. “Exactly,” he confirmed. “A part of me would love to stay here until the end of my days, but there’s another part of me that misses home. And with Jan’s legs getting better there’s nothing really to keep us here.”

“So you’re moving back to Harbourtown?” Isabel asked him.

Farlan nodded. “The witch who lived there passed away recently so they have need for another one,” he explained. “All those seamen with their illnesses. It’s a good place for business.”

“You’re right,” Levi told the man, smiling to ease his mood. “It makes sense for you to move on.”

The preparations still took Farlan and Jan another month and when they finally did say goodbye, Levi felt as if he had been saying goodbye for weeks. They parted smiling, thinking rather of what lay ahead than what they were leaving behind, reminding each other that Harbourtown wasn’t very far after all, and that post was still delivered more or less regularly in these parts. In the end the change wasn’t as drastic as Levi had thought; Farlan had lived at the tailor’s cottage for the month before their departure, and the rooms didn’t feel any emptier now that he had left the town.

Levi had to commend Isabel for how long she kept quiet. She was finished with her training by then, of course, and there was nothing left for Levi to teach her that she hadn’t learned on her own during the months of running the shop. In the end it seemed she taught him more than he taught her, things she had figured out during his absence, potions she had bettered, teas she had enhanced, cures she had created on which their customers now relied. There were days when the only thing left for her to do was to chase away the brats loitering by the shop.

When it finally seemed like she would never open her mouth about it – out of some sort of pity, most likely, now that Farlan had left as well – Levi took it up himself.

“The Royal School of Medicines is looking for a few witches,” he said over dinner one night. “I read about it in the paper. To teach something about remedies and things.”

“Oh?” Isabel uttered. Of course she’d read the paper even before he had, eyes lighting with a mad sparkle at that particular piece of news. “That’s odd.”

“Is it?” Levi asked her. “How so?”

“Well,” she answered, pushing the words through half a potato before swallowing with some effort, “there are no witches in the Capital. And you always say the whole place stinks like a sewer and that having people live on top of each other like that is unnatural.”

Levi clicked his tongue. “It might suit some people, even if I think it’s disgusting,” he stated.

“I wouldn’t know,” Isabel told him. “I’d rather just take your word for it, I think.”

“Well bugger me then,” Levi sighed. “I guess they’re going to have to find themselves another witch. Since you’re clearly not interested.”

A half-chewed piece of potato fell onto Isabel’s plate from her open mouth as she stared at Levi wide-eyed and barely breathing for a good half a minute. “Do you really mean it?” she finally asked, making him click his tongue again.

“I know I can be difficult,” he told her, “but I’m not cruel. Do you really think I would joke about something like this?”

“Oh, but big brother!” she exclaimed, dropping her fork onto the floor with a loud clatter. “How could you do something like this without even asking me?”

“I’m not stupid, you know,” said Levi, frowning. “I know you’ve out-grown this place. There’s no sense in keeping you here anymore. And what kind of a teacher would I be if I didn’t make sure that you’ll go on to the best place I can find for you?”

Levi was relieved when she laughed instead of cried. But then, he knew Isabel.

She left at the end of summer with the biggest suitcase Levi had been able to find in town. He had showed her how to pack it should she ever come for a visit, how to fold her clothes so they wouldn’t get more creases than was necessary, though he doubted she would remember any of it five miles out of the gates. He saw her off as far as that, waving his hand for as long as he could see her and the cart that carried her even as a dot in the horizon.

When he got back to the shop he had to admit the rooms felt empty now and a new kind of silence lingered within them, one that even the hubbub of rush hour couldn’t quite dispel. Levi soon found that running the shop by himself left him with very little time for idleness, a fact he cherished whenever he sat down for dinner alone, or climbed up the stairs to his bedroom, climbing between the sheets that seemed to take longer to warm under his skin after each night he spent between them.

They both sent letters, of course, and sometimes Levi would lie in bed for hours reading through them for the umpteenth time, revelling in the happiness they had reproduced on the pages. He was lousy with his replies – he never seemed to have anything to write about – but still did his best, especially for Isabel from whose first letters he could sense a kind of apprehension; she was still so young, after all. By the time the season started to turn again that uneasiness was long gone, however, and for months her letters had little more in them but ‘Professor Zoë said this’ and ‘Professor Zoë did that’, until the Capital was swept up in some political movement Levi didn’t even pretend to understand, and all the ‘professors’ suddenly turned to ‘academics’ in the name of equality or some such thing.

When the first snows started to fall and melt, an incident occurred that made Levi suddenly remember Erwin again. He hadn’t thought about the man in a long time – had stopped himself from thinking about him was closer to the truth – but when a young woman came nervously into his shop one afternoon, waiting patiently until all the other customers had left before walking up to the counter and asking for a love potion, Levi couldn’t help but remember the man in a vivid flash that made him ache.

“There’s no such thing as love potion,” he told the woman at once, “but how about a nice cup of tea?”

For days afterward he would lie awake at night, his mind growing heavy with memories of Erwin, of the quiet apprehension of his smile, of the soft strength of his voice, of the neatness of his appearance whenever he saw him, save for the night of the wedding. Levi reminded himself again and again of the scents rising up from that cup of tea: green cardamom, wood strawberries, coffee, mint and honey. He thought many a time about brewing himself a cup, but always decided against it – what use would it have been to remember even more of the man, to burden his body and mind even further? For his body seemed just that, burdened with a strain that never seemed to ease, no matter how often Levi tended to that stiffness that plagued him more now in his thirty-fifth year than it had done two decades ago.

The garrison, such as it was after the war, received a new commander before midwinter, a man in his late twenties whom Levi barely saw a handful of times after his arrival before he was already hearing news of his departure. The weather hadn’t agreed with him, said the townsfolk, none of whom seemed to be particularly sad to see him go. Curious to see if the next one would prove a better fit – and to have something to write about to Farlan and Isabel – Levi joined the crowd in the tavern the night the commander arrived. Newcomers were a popular attraction and every table and bench was occupied, and though Levi could have taken his pick of seats should he have wanted to, he decided to stay standing by the wall, his eyes passing over the heads of the people until he found the Captain. He was a tall man, much taller than anyone else in town, with mousy hair and a thin moustache with a patch a beard to go with it. And quiet by the looks of it; while Levi kept watching the people crowding around him, the man didn’t seem to utter a word until he finally turned to someone sitting across the table, smiling and stating something in short. It wasn’t until one of the soldiers in a nearby table tilted his head back in laughter that Levi saw the person to whom the commander had addressed his words, and when he did he felt his breath leave his lungs in a soft inaudible gasp.

It was Erwin.

He sat there holding a pint in his left hand, smiling back at the new commander, saying something that didn’t carry to Levi’s ears over the noise. He was wearing simple clothes, no uniform, no fineries, just plain breeches and a shirt and a simple jacket. Levi’s gaze fell on him hungrily, like no amount of time spent looking at the man could ever sate his craving to see him, happy and smiling, just like he was now. The moment seemed to last for minutes though in truth it was over mere seconds later as the drunken soldier finished laughing, bringing his red-cheeked face between them again, leaving Levi wondering whether he had imagined it, whether that yearning that had grown into the very heart of his being had made him see things that weren’t really there.

 

* * *

 

In the stuffy warmth of the tavern it was easy to forget the cold that just moments ago had gripped them in its iron hold. Erwin had forgotten how cruel it could feel, how deep the wind could cut, how sharp the little flakes of snow falling off rooftops could feel when it blew them into his face. He couldn’t quite tell how he had managed to forget the warm-heartedness of the people, which in his mind acted to balance the climate; perhaps that was what caused it, the friendliness in these parts of the realm. Still he was surprised when after a few pints of ale even Mike started to talk some more; such a quiet man, under normal circumstances.

Erwin had postponed the date of his parting from the Capital after running into the man quite unexpectedly and hearing he was to be the new commander for the northern garrison in town. They had decided then to travel up together, though the delay had caused Erwin no small amount of agitation. He had already been forced to put off his departure when Nile and Marie had asked him to stay past the birth of their first child, to whom Erwin was to be a godfather; a request one could hardly refuse.

There had been a problem with his bill at the sanatorium; since he had resigned from his duties in the military, they seemed suddenly reluctant to pay for the treatment prescribed for an injury he had suffered while still in service. He had made his mind clear enough to them over several well-argued letters, but the whole business had kept him in the Capital for an additional month, during which he received many visitors sent by the Emperor, asking him to reconsider the offer. Erwin had politely declined each time, never neglecting to serve them a good cup of tea.

And here he was now, trying to keep his nerves at bay as he enjoyed a pint with Major Zacharius in the tavern he had once frequented. The people here all remembered him and it seemed his show of approval for the new commander of the garrison went a long way to ensure their support. They asked him about his lack of uniform – a thing that would only have been whispered about behind fans and gloved hands in the Capital – and about his injury which one could hardly miss. Erwin had no words for how much he appreciated it, this openness and honesty; it made his breathing easier and his lips prone to smiling for the first time in two long years.

“Tell me,” Erwin said, turning to Captain Darlett who had joined them at their table shortly after their arrival, “does Mr Ackerman still run the shop hereabouts?”

“Of course,” the Captain assured him. “The other two left recently, Mr Church and Miss Magnolia. Took the tailor with them, too. My mother alters my clothes now, if you can believe it.”

“I see,” said Erwin, smiling. “I’m sad to say I won’t be replacing the tailor. I hardly think my recent injury has improved my needlework.”

“What will you be doing?” Darlett asked. “If one may be so bold as to inquire.”

Erwin took a moment to think, taking a gulp of his ale. “I can’t say that I know yet,” he finally confessed, smiling ever more widely. “Whatever it is, I’m sure it will present itself to me in due time.”

“I’ll say,” Darlett went on. “It’s a good thing your attitude wasn’t quite so lackadaisical while you were a captain here, Mr Smith.”

Erwin laughed, cherishing that address; no more Captain, no more Major, no more masks for him to wear or roles for him to play. Just Mr Erwin Smith, free to be who he was.

“I may have been a trifle strict on some matters,” he agreed readily. “Such as march drills and cleanliness.”

“And coat buttons and the shine on boots,” the Captain continued, “and salutes and the level of noise in the mess hall.”

Erwin laughed again. “Well I hope Mike won’t give you all such a terrible time.”

“I’ll be worse than you,” Mike told him, smiling. “I have so much to live up to.”

“So you do,” Darlett agreed cheerfully. “Tell me, Major Zacharius, do you believe in visitations?”

Erwin’s focus drifted from the conversation and he began to survey the crowd, nodding in acknowledgement every now and then, answering smiles with the same. Many of the men he had once commanded were missing, others having taken their places on the long wooden benches; some he recognised, men who had been a few years off from joining the garrison but had now grown into that role. Marie was gone as well, of course, cradling her child in her arms, humming those northern lullabies; the thought brought Erwin nothing but joy.

It was silly of Erwin to think he could find the man here; Levi wasn’t one to spend too much time in the tavern, Erwin knew, and even if he had made an exception for this night, Erwin could hardly hope to spot him in the throng. Still his eyes kept wandering around the room, making his mind as restless. Of course he hoped things would... Well, resolve themselves, he supposed was the word for it. And he had grounds for that hope, did he not? He remembered Levi’s soot-stained lips; he had whispered something into that gem, something ancient and powerful.

When Erwin had woken in the sick tent, they had told him he was lucky to be alive, that any other man would have died of the injuries he had sustained. But he hadn’t and for months afterward Erwin wondered what fate had decided that he should live to rely on other people’s help. He had imagined formal dinners as a member of the Capital’s high society; his meals cut ready for him while others wielded their knives and forks as commanded by etiquette. The thought had been all but unbearable, the pity in people’s eyes while others still would hardly grant him a glance for how distasteful they found it.

Then he had remembered the amulet, and everything had suddenly fallen into the realm of reason. How could Erwin doubt that the gem had saved him then? How could he not assume it was because it received its strength from something more powerful than the feeling of mere acquaintance, or guilt, or gratitude? Erwin didn’t pretend to understand magic, and he remembered what Levi had told him; love and death are fixed, no amount of witchcraft can change that. But could not these two things, in theory at least, alter each other? Should someone be about to perish, couldn’t their fate regarding love put an end to that other destiny their life held? Erwin had lain awake at night considering that question, nearly ready to put it to the philosophers of the Emperor’s court, though he doubted they could have given him an answer he would have accepted; no, there was really only one person who could.

Erwin got to his feet so suddenly that Mike and Darlett fell quiet in the middle of their conversation, looking up at him in confusion. It seemed ridiculous now that Erwin had spent nearly two hours in the tavern, drinking ale and greeting the people when Levi was the only one he wanted to see, the only one he had returned to the town to see again.

“I have something I need to do,” Erwin told the other men, emptying his pint to ease the nervous flutter in his stomach. “Excuse me.”

He left the tavern at once, looking neither left nor right as he passed through the crowd and out the door, forgetting even his coat; it was a wonder how long it took him to notice but when he finally did, he was closer to the witch’s shop than the tavern, and he doubted anything would have made him turn back now. He marched quickly through the cobbled streets, catching glimpses of candlelight through the drawn shutters in the windows, remembering that habit the northerners had and smiling.

There were no candles in Levi’s windows, no light whatsoever carrying out into the street where Erwin stood, shivering in the cold as he knocked on the door once, twice.

No answer.

He walked to the window to peer inside, making out the hazy shapes of the mismatched chairs and tables and the faintest glow of the embers dying in the fireplace. He squinted to see the rows of bottles on the walls, the long counter across the room, the herbs bunched neatly on the racks, the dry and bare branches of the rosebush by the corner cupboard. Erwin took a step back, shielding his eyes as he looked up toward the second floor, trying to catch anything, a spark of light, a hint of movement in the windows, a sign that someone was–

“You’re not going to start shouting again, I hope.”

Erwin turned around in the street, eyes searching the darkness. He knew that voice of course but didn’t dare hope, didn’t dare believe it until–

“Someone will think you’re up to no good, sneaking around in the dark like this,” Levi told him, walking closer and past him, to the door. “Come in. You look like you could use a cup of tea.”

Erwin stood still for another stunned moment that seemed to wipe away all that nervousness from before, all that time spent apart, all that worrying and wondering and pain. Smiling, he stepped forward and into the shop, letting that fragrant warmth envelop him and remind him of the hours he spent here, those happy moments that required no further examination or explanation. He took a seat, just like he had used to before, as Levi busied himself with the tea.

“The shop seems to be as it was,” said Erwin as Levi placed the kettle on to boil.

“It is,” the man told him, lighting a candle and carrying to the table, “though Farlan and Isabel have left.”

“Yes, I heard,” Erwin remarked. “You seem to manage well by yourself.”

“I do,” Levi assured him, sitting down at the table, looking at Erwin solemnly. “Do you?”

Erwin glanced at the stump of his arm, uttering a laugh. “It has taken some getting used to,” he admitted, the first time he had, “but I manage very well.”

Levi nodded. “Some things must be difficult,” he said, leaning his chin against the palm of his hand.

“Yes,” Erwin granted without any bitterness. “There are things that would be easier with some help.”

“The army didn’t want you then?”

“I resigned,” Erwin explained. “I have seen enough of war for one lifetime.”

“I never thought it suited you,” Levi told him suddenly. “It made you hide too much.”

“Yes,” whispered Erwin. “I have been hiding so many things.” He lifted his gaze to meet Levi’s. “The amulet you gave me – I’m afraid I lost it.”

Levi smiled; that odd, quiet expression. “Don’t worry,” he said. “It did what it was supposed to. You won’t need it anymore – it, or anything like it – now that you’re here.”

“It has been my wish for so long,” Erwin told him, though he knew he didn’t need to. “The worst months of my life were when I couldn’t remember this place. When I couldn’t remember you.”

“There had to be a price,” Levi said, suddenly mournful. “I only wish I could have paid it myself.”

Erwin shook his head. “There’s nothing I wouldn’t give for this,” he whispered, “and nothing I regret having given.”

They forewent the tea that night as Levi took Erwin’s hand in his, leading him up the stairs and into his bedroom. There was a quiet strength in the way Levi touched him, a patient keenness in the way he undressed him and gazed at him, like the sight of Erwin’s maimed body held to him some boundless fascination that defied explanation. Erwin’s skin grew warm under Levi’s eyes, his mind grew alert as his body grew willing and it never occurred to him now how long he had waited for this. He ran his fingers into Levi’s hair, gasping even from that softness. His cheeks glowed hot with a blush when Levi pressed his lips against the palm of his hand, against the tips of his fingers, guiding it down to pull loose that piece of cloth from around his neck. Erwin didn’t struggle with the buttons this time.

They fell slowly onto the bed, lips meeting in kisses that grew more impatient the further their hands ventured on their explorations. Even now and beyond that rush and heat of excitement Erwin could name a thousand things he adored; the curve of Levi’s back when he ran his fingers down his spine, the taste of his skin, the feel of the coarse hair under his arms, the soft gasps that escaped his mouth, Erwin’s guides in the strange realm that Levi’s body still remained. And how he wanted to know all of it, every tender spot, every treasured point, he wanted to know all the things that would make Levi sigh and moan and shiver. He had thought he would feel clumsy, inadequate and embarrassed, but nothing could have been further from how it was, how graceful and steady Levi made him feel. His touches were firm and grounding, guiding him and teaching him without leaving room for shame even when his pleasure peaked after a mere instant of Levi’s mouth on him.

Without losing a moment Erwin pulled the man to him, taking pleasure in the feel of the soft downy hair on Levi’s thigs against his lips as he kissed his way between his legs, letting the man lean into the sensation. He could taste the salt and sweat on his tongue, could feel each eager twitch as his fingers continued their exploration, making note of everything that made Levi push against his hand or further between his lips and everything that made him groan or swear in a hasty whisper. To surrender under Levi’s touch was bliss, to feel the man’s fingers pulling at his hair at the edge of his climax felt too soft, too reserved, not enough like they had been doing this for years. It was only after Levi fell on the bed beside him that Erwin noticed how breathless he was, how utterly enfeebled and spent, and how completely, completely free.

“Could this be our life?” he asked Levi in a whisper, pulling the man close.

“I can’t imagine anything I’d ever want more,” he told Erwin quietly, leaning into his touch.

The following day Erwin released his room at the tavern, caring not a bit about the swarm of gossip as he carried his meagre belongings into Levi’s house where they fit more comfortably than he would have thought. They spent their days running the shop – Erwin was well aware that for the first few weeks he was more trouble than he was worth, knocking down jars of tea, confusing labels, misplacing things and driving Levi up the wall – and their nights awake, ever inventing new ways to give each other pleasure. In a week Erwin had forgotten everything he had ever thought about the suitable roles for men like him in the bedroom; after two weeks they started to feel absolutely ridiculous.

By the time the rosebush on their floor started to make new leaves again, Erwin had found what it was that he was meant to do here, turning the empty tailor’s cottage into a small school, ordering books from the Capital at his own expense. It was his principle to admit everyone into his classroom, even those children who had no means to pay him for the lessons they received. At midday he would take all his pupils to the shop where they took over half a dozen tables and spilled tea everywhere, making Levi click his tongue as he carried in scones and rosehip jam, muttering to himself about the mess and the noise, calling them filthy brats when they broke his teacups. Erwin knew he didn’t really mind it; when they would lie awake at night, talking quietly and planning their future, Levi would name dozens of little improvements for the school and come up with as many lessons he could teach the children once they had grown up some.

Erwin would fall asleep with Levi still whispering them to his ear, and dream of the next day, and the day after that.


End file.
